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The Soul of the Obama Administration
Townhall.com ^ | February 14, 2014 | Mona Charen

Posted on 02/14/2014 6:12:30 AM PST by Kaslin

Few have ever heard the name Debo Adegbile. He's President Barack Obama's nominee to head the civil rights division of the Justice Department.

A few months ago, his nomination would have been a non-starter -- there is more than a whiff of radicalism in his past. But we are in a new world. Sen. Harry Reid is now absolute monarch of the Senate. Republicans are largely irrelevant. They cannot offer amendments to legislation. They cannot filibuster. I suppose they can write letters to the editor, and march outside the chamber wearing sandwich boards.

Before the Reid invocation of the "nuclear option" eliminating the filibuster, Adegbile would have been considered too controversial. But now, the administration can have its head on nominations.

Adegbile is a passionate advocate for racial quotas in hiring and university admissions, and also urges that employers not be permitted to do background checks on potential hires -- presumably because more African-Americans have criminal records than other applicants. He has encouraged the president to nominate judges who recognize that "ratified treaties" are the law of land. Well, no argument there, but he goes further. Adegbile wants judges who will decree that "customary international law" is the law of the United States as well, asking for God only knows what mischief. Who would decide what "customary international law" is? By what authority would it be imposed on Americans? Investor's Business Daily reports that Adegbile supports George Soros's campaign to create a new "progressive" constitution. If that doesn't make the hair on the back of your neck stand up, you're not paying attention.

It was Adegbile's role in the case of convicted cop killer Mumia Abu-Jamal that incurred the wrath of Justice Department employees though. The union representing FBI agents, which rarely expresses itself on nominations, along with the Fraternal Order of Police and other law enforcement groups, have written to Attorney General Eric Holder to protest Adegbile's nomination. Carl Rowan Jr., a former deputy U.S. marshal, FBI special agent and chief of police, wrote: "He isn't the first questionable nomination made by a president who ... seems drawn to those with radical backgrounds, but this one is an open slap in the face to everyone in law enforcement."

Abu-Jamal has long been a poster boy for the radical left in America. His fine speaking voice (he had been a radio host), long dreadlocks, Muslim moniker (he was born Wesley Cook), radical memberships (in the Black Panthers and black liberation group MOVE), and admiration of Mao Zedong made him irresistible to the Ed Asners, Jonathan Kozolses, National Lawyers Guilds, Michael Moores and NPRs of the world. But until this administration, most mainstream liberals would have steered clear.

Adegbile revealed a great deal about himself by choosing to have the NAACP Legal Defense Fund join the campaign to defend Abu-Jamal. There are many miscarriages of justice that cry out for redress, but Abu-Jamal's 1981 conviction for killing 25-year-old Philadelphia policeman Daniel Faulkner is one of the most litigated in American jurisprudence. The verdict was reviewed or allowed to stand by the Pennsylvania Supreme Court, the U.S. Third Circuit Court of Appeals, and the U.S. Supreme Court, among others, over the course of more than 30 years.

On Dec. 9, 1981, at about 4 a.m., Faulkner pulled over a driver named William Cook (Abu-Jamal's brother) for driving the wrong way on a one-way street. Cook threw a punch at Faulkner, who then hit Cook with his flashlight. At that point, four eyewitnesses said that Abu-Jamal, who had been across the street, fired at Faulkner hitting him in the back. Though wounded, Faulkner fired back at Abu-Jamal, hitting him in the chest, before falling onto his back. Abu-Jamal approached the wounded officer and holding his gun 18 inches in front of Faulkner's face, fired the shots that killed him.

Ballistics confirmed that the bullets that killed Faulkner were from Abu-Jamal's gun, found with him at the scene.

Abu-Jamal was sentenced to death, but decades of litigation and agitation on his behalf delayed the sentence. He has claimed ineffective assistance of counsel (though at one point he represented himself), racism by the judge, racism in jury selection -- the usual gamut. In 2011, prosecutors announced that they would no longer pursue the death penalty.

Every defendant deserves a defense, of course. But Abu-Jamal has had a celebrity lineup of lefty lawyers. That Adegbile wanted to join their ranks is a sign of his sympathies. That Obama believes Adegbile can get confirmed by the neutered Senate is a sign of the times.


TOPICS: Culture/Society; Editorial; Government
KEYWORDS: 0bamaadmin; courts; judgesandcourts; onthehill
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1 posted on 02/14/2014 6:12:30 AM PST by Kaslin
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To: Kaslin

why dont they just announce him as the replacement for holder and be done with it


2 posted on 02/14/2014 6:22:32 AM PST by bigheadfred
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To: bigheadfred

“why dont they just announce him as the replacement for holder and be done with it”

They will as soon as they can work out how to retire Ginsburg and get Holder a seat on SCOTUS I without anyone knowing.

Figure Memorial Day weekend because if you are going to screw America, what better date?


3 posted on 02/14/2014 6:36:33 AM PST by EQAndyBuzz (Insurgent Conservative)
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To: Kaslin

It is just a daily assault from this Administration.


4 posted on 02/14/2014 6:40:26 AM PST by Rummyfan (Iraq: it's not about Iraq anymore, it's about the USA!)
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To: Kaslin
The Soul of the Obama Administration


5 posted on 02/14/2014 6:42:37 AM PST by Servant of the Cross (the Truth will set you free)
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To: Kaslin
Science Fiction, right ?

Maybe like rocketry and robots, they'll discover it some 70 to a hundred years later, but right now ... ?

6 posted on 02/14/2014 6:49:15 AM PST by knarf (I say things that are true .. I have no proof .. but they're true.)
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To: Servant of the Cross

BTTT


7 posted on 02/14/2014 6:52:51 AM PST by Kaslin (He neeExcelded the ignorant to reelect him, and he got them. Now we all have to pay the consequenses)
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To: Kaslin

Strange title—I haven’t seen any evidence of a “soul” anywhere in the o administration.


8 posted on 02/14/2014 7:01:40 AM PST by basil (2ASisters.org)
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To: basil
“The Soul of the Obama Administration”.

Isn't that some type of oxymoron? They actually HAVE a soul?

9 posted on 02/14/2014 7:03:22 AM PST by DaveA37
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To: Kaslin; Liz; sickoflibs; LucyT; MrB; Mr. K; neverdem
Adegbile is a passionate advocate for racial quotas in hiring and university admissions, and also urges that employers not be permitted to do background checks on potential hires -- presumably because more African-Americans have criminal records than other applicants...he goes further. Adegbile wants judges who will decree that "customary international law" is the law of the United States ...

OK, Holder's looking much better than he did before I read this... maybe Holder and his haters should stay...

10 posted on 02/14/2014 7:21:33 AM PST by GOPJ ( America's drifting into totalitarianism because of left's exploitation of social failures.Greenfie)
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To: GOPJ

I said, when the Holder resignation was announced, that his replacement would be worse. They always are.


11 posted on 02/14/2014 7:22:27 AM PST by MrB (The difference between a Humanist and a Satanist - the latter admits whom he's working for)
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To: GOPJ; Kaslin; Liz; LucyT; MrB; Mr. K; neverdem

Convicted criminals are definitely a key voting block for Dems.

When Martin O Malley and his Dem legislature took over Maryland first thing they passed is voting rights for convicts.

And then tuition aid for illegals, now they get their own special drivers licensees, before Maryland just gave them the same ones we get but Federal law stopped that, so special licenses for them was O Malley’s fix...

Criminals are key to Dems.


12 posted on 02/14/2014 7:31:09 AM PST by sickoflibs (Obama : 'Any path to US citizenship for illegals HERE is a special path to it ')
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To: sickoflibs

Holder wants to restore their voting rights and we know exactly why


13 posted on 02/14/2014 7:38:27 AM PST by Kaslin (He neeExcelded the ignorant to reelect him, and he got them. Now we all have to pay the consequenses)
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To: Kaslin
Well, no argument there, but he goes further. Adegbile wants judges who will decree that "customary international law" is the law of the United States as well, asking for God only knows what mischief.

this is (sadly) not radical. The United States has been abiding by the (unratified) Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties for over thirty years. It is becoming settled law before our eyes, which makes Zero's signature on the UN Convention on Small Arms truly concerning.

14 posted on 02/14/2014 7:38:47 AM PST by Carry_Okie (0-Care IS Medicaid; they'll pull a sheet over your head and take everything you own to pay for it.)
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To: MrB

You were totally right on this one... this guy’s going to be much worse.


15 posted on 02/14/2014 7:58:47 AM PST by GOPJ ( America's drifting into totalitarianism because of left's exploitation of social failures.Greenfie)
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To: GOPJ

That’s the way it always is with totalitarians. Forgot if it was Sowell or Hayek that gave the scenario of the whip holder refusing to do that thing that is just beyond what his conscience allows, and another guy stepping up and saying “I’ll do that”.

(Saul and murdering the priests in 1 Sam 22)


16 posted on 02/14/2014 8:14:14 AM PST by MrB (The difference between a Humanist and a Satanist - the latter admits whom he's working for)
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To: basil
Strange title—I haven’t seen any evidence of a “soul” anywhere in the o administration.

That's because it was sold just before the inept druggie's incomprehensible rise to power.

17 posted on 02/14/2014 9:49:28 AM PST by Pollster1 ("Shall not be infringed" is unambiguous.)
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To: Kaslin

18 posted on 02/14/2014 11:18:22 AM PST by gura (If Allah is so great, why does he need fat sexually confused fanboys to do his dirty work? -iowahawk)
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To: GOPJ

BOOBAMBA'S HORRIFYING JUDICIAL NOMINEE---Blood-thirsty Cornelia Pillard is a radical pro-abortion extremist. The right to an abortion, she argues, is necessary to help “free women from historically routine conscription into maternity.” She also contends that men and women who oppose government mandates on employers to provide insurance coverage for contraception “reinforce broader patterns of discrimination against women as a class of presumptive breeders.”

Pillard complains ultrasound produces “deceptive images of fetus-as-autonomous-being that the 'anti-choice movement' has popularized since the advent of amniocentesis.” The notion that ultrasound produces images of autonomous beings is absurd. No one claims that the images are of something that is autonomous. Pillard’s concern is that ultrasound images look too much like something people want to protect. (powerlineblog.com)

Harvard and Yale graduate Pillard now a Georgetown U law professor---previously served as a deputy assistant to the attorney general in the Office of Legal Counsel and assistant to the solicitor general.

“The D.C. Circuit is known as the second highest court in the country, and there’s a good reason for that. The judges on the D.C. Circuit routinely have the final say on a broad range of cases involving everything from national security to environmental policy; from questions of campaign finance to workers’ rights. In other words, the court’s decisions impact almost every aspect of our lives,” Obama said. (theblaze.com)

19 posted on 02/14/2014 12:21:43 PM PST by Liz
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To: Kaslin
RE :”Holder wants to restore their voting rights and we know exactly why”

Although except for the VRA, voting rules are controlled by the states not the Feds.

20 posted on 02/14/2014 1:37:03 PM PST by sickoflibs (Obama : 'Any path to US citizenship for illegals HERE is a special path to it ')
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