The Red/Blue Divide

I have been fascinated for years by the red/blue divide in this country. One issue after another illustrates this divide, whether it be infant mortality, use of capital punishment, spending for education, and on and on.

But the most stiking illustration I have ever seen occurs when we look at CoVid vaccination rates by state. The top 21 states in vaccination rates are all blue (voted Democratic in the last Presidential election), and the bottom 16 are all red (voted GOP in last election). The top "red" state is Iowa at #22, and Iowa is really more purple than red. The lowest "blue" state is Nevada at #35, and, like Iowa, Nevada is really more purple than blue.

Of the fifteen lowest states, nine are from the old confederacy. The only exceptions among the eleven confederate states are Florida, which has turned purple due to the influx of retired northerners, and Virginia, which has turned blue in recent elections.

Of the seven lowest states not from the old confederacy, two are western mountain states (Idaho and Wyoming), and two are prairie states (Kansas and North Dakota). Then there is Missouri, which is southern in spirit but never actually seceded, and Oklahoma, which surely would have seceded had it then been a state. The oddest outlier is West Virginia, which had its origins in its desire to remain in the union (and how odd it is that the union thought it perfectly OK for West Virginia to secede from Virginia, but wrong for the southern states to secede from the U.S.), but in recent years has turned red, for reasons which are not clear to me.

If we look at states which have the death penalty, we see another strong red/blue correlation, though not quite as stiking as the vaccination correlation. Of the 24 states which voted for Biden, only three have the death penalty: Arizona, Nevada, and Georgia. And of the 26 Trump states, only four don't have the death penalty: North Dakota, West Virginia, Iowa, and Alaska.

Had Lincoln done the right thing and allowed the seven confederate states who originally seceded to "go in peace", we woud have a much more unified country. Lincoln's war-mongering has led to the mess we're in today.

The Price of Adventurism

Here is a game I played today on chessbase. My higher-rated opponent gets duly punished for his materialism in the opening.

1 d4 d5 2 c4 Nf6 This is being played a lot against me recently. The point of it is unclear to me. 3 Nc3 I have not yet gone to the trouble of exploring the nuances of 3 cd. Consulting a database, I see now that 3 cd scores much better than 3 Nc3, with 73% wins for white! Normal play continues 3...Nxd5 4 e4 Nf6 5 Nc3 e6 6 Nf3 Be7 7 Bd3 0-0 8 0-0 and white's win percentage is now 95.5%!!

3...Bf5 This seems too adventurous, but it scores about as well as any other move except 3...g6. 4 e3? This is white's worst move. Best seems to be 4 Qb3, hitting the undefended pawn at b7. 4...e6 5 Nf3 Nc6 6 a3 Here I managed to find the most usual move for white.

6...h6 7 Bd3 BxB 8 QxB Na5 9 cd Nb3? Here is where black goes wrong. 10 de?! I miss 10 Qb5+, picking off the N/b3. Still, I have a 3-point advantage. 10...NxR 11 ef+ KxP 12 Nd2 c5 The engine now has it equal, but his next move gives me a slight advantage.

13 0-0 Be7 14 Qb1 cd 15 ed Re8 16 QxN The engine actually now has black slightly ahead. 16...Qxd4 17 Nf3 Qb6 18 Qa2+ Kf8?? This runs into mate. Correct is 18...Kg6 and the game goes on. 19 Ne5 Red8 20 Qf7#. An entertaining game.

Sanctions for Trump Lawyers

The other shoe is starting to drop for Trump lawyers who filed frivolous election lawsuits. In a hearing Monday in the Michigan case, U.S. District Judge Linda Parker chastised the Trump lawyers for filing a case that was "nothing but speculation and conjecture" . No decision yet, but severe sanctions seem likely.

In the UK the losing side is required to pay the winner's legal fees. I think this goes too far, since you can file a suit in perfectly good faith, but still lose for one reason or another. And how do you define "losing"? If you ask for $10,000 and get a verdict for $5,000, is that a win or a loss?

In the US attorneys can be sanctioned for filing a frivolous case, and you have a duty to investigate before making accusations in a petition initiating a lawsuit. Trump's lawsuits surely qualify as "frivolous", and filed in "bad faith", and I hope judges have the courage to impose appropriate sanctions. Hitting these unscrupulous lawyers where it counts, in their pocketbooks, is the only way, short of disbarment, to make the point properly.

Another motion for sanctions will be heard this morning in Colorado, and I'm excited to see how that turns out.

Lilyhammer

I recently binge-watched all three seasons of "Lillyhammer", and I can't believe how engrossing this Netflix series is. It never loses interest. Most of the people responsible for the series are Norwegian; in fact, pretty much all escept Steven van Zandt, who stars and is also given credit as a writer and executive producer.

The aspects of Norwegian culture featured in the series are realistic, as far as I can discern. For example, I had never heard of reindeer races, but it turns out that reindeer racing is quie popular in northern Norway, Finland, and Russia.

The winter scenes have always captivated me, as I much prefer winter weather to summer weather. This is one thing that has attracted me to movies like "Fargo" and "Beatutiful Girls", the great winter scenes, with lots of snow.

But what has most captivated me about this great series are the references, both direct and indirect, to great movies of the past. The opening scene in season two is right out of "The Godfather", where an aggrieved citizen is making a plea for help, and for a long time it shows his face without showing who he is talking to. Many of the lines are word for word from the opening scene in "The Godfather".

The first sheriff of Lillehammer is an exact takeoff of the female sheriff in "Fargo". There is a direct reference to "Goodfellas", where Johnny is berating a guy for saying he is funny, and Johnny then says he is mimicing Tommy from "Goodfellas". In another scene Johnny connects with an autistic boy by using lines from "Angels with Dirty Faces". The line "I'm the guy who's telling you the way it is" is taken from "Get Shorty", and possibly other movies as well. In two scenes right out of "Godfather II", a guy who is about to get whcked gets taken out on a boat for fishing.

When Johnny and his men are on a mission, Johnny's dim-witted assistant suggests they call themeselves by colors, like in "Reservoir Dogs". Johnny points out that the purpose of that was so they don't know each other's names. At one point the assistant says "I could have been a contender", right out of "On the Waterfront".

When the mob sends two men over to Norway to assassinate Johnny, the two bungle around just like the two thiefs in "Home Alone". And the girls in bikinis coming out of an RV to entice the two guys into partying with them are right out of "Dumb and Dumber".

The final episode, appropriately entitled "Loose Ends", is particularly noteworthy. The loose ends are indeed tied up, and the theme is developed of whether Frankie's time has come and gone, whether it is time for him to give way to a younger (and meaner) generation, as represented by the guy Tommy who refused to leave Norway when ordered to. Tommy gets his comeuppance,and the old guard survives intact. I was pleased that the Brazilian beauty has a big part in the finale, and many of her lines are quite poetic.

The NCAA Finally Gets Its Hands Slapped

Kudos to the Supreme Court for siding with the student-athletes against the NCAA. In a 9-0 decision, the Court ruled that the NCAA is an illegal monopoly, using a straightforward application of the Sherman Antitrust Act.

And special kudos to Justice Kavanaugh, who wrote a hard-hitting concurring opinion saying that athletes should be paid, ending with "Nowhere else in America can businesses get away with agreeing not to pay their workers a fair market rate on the theory that their product is defined by not paying their workers a fair market rate. And under ordinary principles of antitrust law, it is not evident why college sports should be any different. The NCAA is not above the law."

The NCAA has long operated without regard for the law or common sense. An example is the Ohio State case, in which the NCAA complained that athletes were getting discounts from a local car dealer. When asked about this, the dealer replied, "We give a discount to any customer who asks for it." Everyone who's ever bought a car knows this is the case, this is how car dealers traditionally operate." Everyone, that is, except the idiot NCAA investigators.

The suspension of Terrelle Pryor and four of his OSU teammates for five games for selling memorabilia is another example. Suspended for selling items they themselves owned! How absurd! When Johnny Manzeiel was confronted with this ridiculous NCAA rule, he responded that the NCAA makes money off me, which shouldn't I be able to. The NCAA denied this, but the next day an enterprising sportswriter went to the NCAA web site and noticed that they were indeed selling Johnny Manziel jerseys!

The NCAA arguments in this case were incredibly lame. This is illustrated by the fact that the District Court, Court of Appeals, and Supreme Court all went against it, with clear-headed analysis that is legally irrefutable. Colleges make millions, even billions, off of the backs of unpaid athletes. It's time to end this corrupt system.

Making a Murderer: The Tragic Tale of Steven Avery

In "Trial 4" we saw how the prejudice against blacks can affect a criminal case in an urban setting. In "Making a Murderer", we have an example of the small-town prejudice against lower-class whites affecting a criminal case.

The Avery family operated an auto salvage yard on forty acres in rural Manitowoc County, Wisconsin. In July of 1985, a woman named Penny Beernsteen was attacked and sexually assaulted while jogging on a Lake Michigan beach. After describing her attacker to authorities, a Manitowox deptuy sherrif said, "It sounds like Steve Avery". From then on, the sheriff's office focused on Steve Avery and he was convicted. After serving 18 years of his sentence, the Wisconsin Innocence Project used DNA testing to exonerate him and he was realeased.

Two years after his release, a photographer named Teresa Halbach was murdered after photographing a van on Steve Avery's property. Halbach's vehicle was found on the Avery junkyard a few days later, and Steven was arrested and charged with her murder. The first season of "Making a Murderer", released in December of 2015, follows the trials and convictions of Avery, and his nephew Brendan Dassey, for the murder.

After the first season was released, the Avery and Dassey cases became quite well-known, and attorney Kathleen Zellner became involved on Avery's behalf, and the Northwestern Law School Innocence Project on Dassey's behalf. Season two follows their efforts to get justice for Avery and Dassey, but as of this writing they are both sitll incarcerated.

What I want to do is discuss a number of the issues in both the Avery and Dassey cases.

Steven's Trial Attorneys

Steven had two trial attorneys who wholeheartedly believed in his innocence, and poured their hearts and souls into defending him. The show often depicts them talking between themselves planning strategy, and it is obvious their goal was to leave no stone unturned in their efforts to obtain justice for their client.

After season one was released, the two became national celebrities, and nationwide speaking tours were arranged for them. Despite this fame, when post-conviction attonrey Kathleen Zellner got involved, she discovered many deficiencies in their representation, and part of her Motion for post-conviction relief was the incompetence of Steven's trial counsel. The thing which most jumps out at me in this regard is the failure of the defense attorneys to present evidence of the police dogs which were brought to the scene after the victim's vehicle was discovered on the Avery property. The dogs, consisting of both scent dogs and cadaver dogs, immediately went onto the neighboring property, which was a quarry. This could have led to a plausible theory that the victim was actually killed on the adjoining property, and then she and her car were later dumped onto the Avery property.

The State's Attorneys

The state brought in as a special prosecutor a DA from another Wisconsin county. This man, Ken Kratz, came across as a slimy, oily, sleazebag, and later events confirmed this impression. He has since lost his DA job and has been suspended from the practice of law. He has been vilified across the country for his obvious low character.

The impetus for his downfall was the plethora of sexting he engaged in with female domestic violence victims who he was supposed to be advocating for. At least fifteen women have come forward complaining of his harassment of them.

In discussing the trial afer it ended, one of Steven's trial attorneys lamented the prosecution's tunnel vision in pursuing Avery instead of keeping an open mind and looking into other theories of the crime. He stated that the prosecutor showed "a tragic lack of humility" in not admitting of the possibility that he might be wrong.

Kathleen Zellner has found a striking number of instances in which evidence which should have been turned over to the defense (called "Brady" evidence, meaning it might be exculpatory) was not turned over. Just another example of the incompetence and sheer hubris of the state's attorneys.

Depicting the Averys

The show spends a lot of time depicting the life of the Avery clan, who live on a series of trailer homes and pre-fab houses on their forty acres. At first this seems unnecessary, and even looks like an attempt to show what a pathetic lifestyle they have. These are cleasrly people who some might refer to as "poor white trash", or "trailer court trash". Indeed, comments made by towns people include "We need to end the gene pool here", and "The Avery family is pure evil".

However, as the series moves on, we begin to have sympathy for these people who are, after all, working hard and trying to scratch out a living under extremely adverse circumstances. The town people may not like them, but they still persevere and carry on with their hardscrabble lives.

And after the first season was released, the tide of public opinion turned in favor of the Averys, and they now get many letters of support on a daily basis, and they have a number of Facebook support groups. So, the approach Netflix took in depicting them in such detail has turned out to be a positive thing.

As of this writing, Steven's parents are still alive, well into their '80s, and are doing reasonably well.

The Denny Issue.

Steven's attorneys were prevented by the judge from presenting evidence that someone else could have committed this crime. This was based on the so-called Denny standard, which says that evidence that a third party committed the crime cannot be based on mere speculation; rather, the defense must show three things: 1) motive, 2) opportunity, and 3) evidence to directly connect the third person to the crime charged which is not remote in time, place or circumstances.

My first reaction was that this standard, which is based on a 1984 Wisconcin case, is unnecessariy harsh; after all, motive is not even an element of any crime. However, after reading the opinion, I see that the opinion was actually a relaxation of the previous standard, in that the word "substantial" was removed as a modifier of "evidence" in the third factor stated above.

Bobby Dassey

One of the state's key witnesses was Bobby Dassey, who is Steven's nephew and the brother of Brandan Dassey. He appeared on the stand as a clean-cut, neatly dressed young man, and surely made a good impression on the jury compared to the rest of the motley-looking Avery clan. Bobby testified that he saw the victim on Steven's property photographing the car she was hired to photograph, and then saw her heading toward Steven's trailer. A few minutes later, when Bobby left to go deer hunting, he said her car was still on the property, but she was not to be seen.

In the course of her work on Steven's behalf, Kathleen Zellner uncovered evidence that Booby had hundreds, perhaps even thousands, of photographs on his hard drive of women being raped, tortured, and killed. This was evidence the state had in its possession but failed to turn over to the defense, in violation of the state's duty under Brady. Kathleen's reinactments of the crime showed that Bobby could easiy have been the killer, by following Teresa's car over to the adjoining property, and then killing her. Had this eidence been available to the defense at trial, the Denny standard likely could have been met.

But the biggest bombshell regarding Bobby Dassey has just recently been unearthed by the zealous Ms. Zellner. She recently, since the second season was released, leaarned that there is a witness who saw Bobby and another man pushing the victim's car onto the Avery property! This witness, a newspaper delivery driver, says he called the county sheriff's office and related what he had seen, but was told "We already know who did it". Kathleen says tips are comiong in to her office daily with ideas about who the second man might have been, and it seems only a matter of time until her efforts prevail and Steven Avery finally receives the justice he has been waiting so long for. Stay tuned.

Kathleen Zellner

Like Rosemary Scapiccio in "Trial 4", we have in Ms. Zellner a tenacious, energetic attorney who doesn't quit unti she gets justice for her innocent clients. Her efforts on behalf of Steven are legendary. She consulted the top experts in the country in many areas of forensic science, in order to test the state's evidence, none of which has stood up to her close scurtiny. She has consulted experts in the fields of blood spattering, DNA testing, and body burning, among many others.

The result of her work is a 1276-page Motion for a New Trial filed on Steven's behalf in 2017. Despite this voluminous evidence presented on Steven's behalf, she was unsuccessful in obtaining a new trial. However, just within the past two months she filed another motion, after the newspaper delivery man came forward with his new evidence of seeing Bobby Dassey and another man pushing Teresa's vehicle onto the Avery property. It seems doubtful the courts can ignore this compelling new evidence.

When she took on the Avery case, Kathleen had obtained 17 exonerations of innocent defendants, and she is determined to make Steven her 18th. She says she takes on this work because of the satisfaction she feels when she walks an innocent client out of prison, after years of false imprisonment.

Brain Fingerprinting

At one point during Kathleen's reprsentation of him, Steven agreed to undergo brain fingerprinting, a procedure which can detect what information is stored inside a person's brain. Steven passed with flying colors, and there apparently is now way to fool this procedure.

The Brendan Dassey case was tried separately from Steven's, and presents a whole different set of issues, so it will be dealt with in another post.

Trial 4: The Tragic Tale of Sean Ellis

Sean Ellis was a 19-year-old Bostonian when he was arrested and charged with the cold-blooded murder of a Boston police detective. The case is the subject of an 8-part Netflix documentary, called "Trial 4", which I watched recently.

The detective had been shot between the eyes while he was sleeping in his car outside a Walgreen's store, where he was working nights as a private security guard. The shooting was clearly an execution-style shooting, not a robbery gone bad.

The investigation focused on Sean Ellis after Ellis was interviewed in connection with another, unrelated, crime, and volunteered that he had been at the Walgreen's that night to buy pampers. Ellis was tried three times, the first two ending in mistrials when the jury was deadlocked, one time 9-3 for acquittal, and the other 10-2 for acquittal.

Ellis spent 22 years in prison, until finally an absolutely amazing defense attorney named Rosemary Scapicchio took on his case and won him a new trial. Her tenacity in this case is simply astounding. For example, she spent nine years trying to get documents that had been covered up and never revealed to Sean's earlier attorneys. The authorities stonewalled her at every step of the way, throwing one roadblock after another in her path, when they bothered to even respond to her requests at all.

When she finally got the documents, they revealed the rampant corruption of the deceased and three of his fellow detectives, who would regularly rob drug dealers of money and drugs, manufacture evidence, lie to obtain search warrants, etc. The other big finding from the documents was that witnesses were paid (bribed) for their testimony. Most concerning was a woman who claimed to have seen Ellis crouching outside the deceased's car. This ID was made after the detectives had coached her on what to say. The detectives working the case were the same three crooked detectives that were "partners in crime" with the deceased.

The camera follows Rosemary and Sean as they prepare for the fourth trial. She's been able to get him out on bond, so Ellis is now able to visit her at her office and help in his defense. This goes on for a considerable length of time, until the Boston DA's office finally decides not to go ahead with the fourth trial.

My main takeaway from all this is the absolute corruption of the Irish Catholic culture in Boston. The Irish Catholic hierarchy, the same type of people who tolerated and covered up the rampant abuse of altar boys by Catholic priets in Boston, are seen to be coarse, corrupt, dishonest, authoritarian jerks. The three crooked detetvices are not shown--they were convicted and did federal time for their crimes. However, others in the PD were interviewed, like the chief of police, the head of the Homicide Bureau, and other detectives on the force. All are detestable human beings who are unable to admit that a grave error had been made in purusing Sean Ellis for a crime he clearly did not commit.

Another takeaway is the valuable service provided by the news media in subjecting injustices like this to the light of day. The Boston Globe was instrumental in exposign the corruption of the four crooked detectives, just like it had been instrumental in exposing the corruption in the Cathlic Church regarding the sexual abuse of altar boys (as depicted in the movie "Spotlight"). And, of course, Netflix itself is acting here as part of the news media in bringing this injustice to light. Many Kudos to Netflix!

A third takeaway is the valuable role played by the Innocence Project, which apparently funded the defense so Ellis could finally achieve some semblance of justice. The attorney's persistence is the stuff of legends.

Another takeaway is the evil influence of the Boston police union. When the prosecutor on the case sought to have one of the corrupt detectives removed from the case, the pollice union vociferously objected, and tried to get the prosecutor removed from the case and fired. The defense of corrupt detectives illustrates the downside of unions. I'm reminded of the case where Albert Belle viciously elbowed second baseman Fernando Vina in the face. When the players union took up Belle's cause, Vina responded, "What about me, I'm a memebr of the union too". It seems unions get caught up in the weeds defending the indefensible actions of a few bad apples, and lose sight of the bigger picture of what is good for the membership as a whole.

The case illustrates the "tunnel vision" that law enforcement gets when it focuses on one suspect, and then follows up all leads pointing to that suspect and disregards leads pointing in other directions. Here there were actually two other credible accounts of how the murder actually occurred, but the police simply ignored them.

The racism in pursuing a black man for this crime is obvious, and I can't help but think back to when Boston was the worst Northern city in fighting the integration of its pubic schools. Boston might be a good place to visit due to its rich history, but I sure wouldn't want to live there.