"She is the Rosetta stone. She knows everything. She arranged every single trip, and if she was just given… immunity, she could be compelled to testify."

Said Alan Dershowitz, quoted in "Trump’s MAGA allies zero in on Ghislaine Maxwell as Epstein furor persists/The intensifying focus on Ghislaine Maxwell represents the latest turn in a winding case that has long been a focus of conspiracy theorists" (NYT).

I'm sure her testimony is valuable, but I see at least 5 problems with the Dershowitz assertion: 1. She may have misunderstood or misperceived what she witnessed when she witnessed it. 2. She will have forgotten some things, 3. She may misremember when she attempts to recall when she is questioned now, 4. She has so much reason now to lie, distort, or at least shape her story to serve her obvious self-interest, 5. Arranging a trip doesn't mean that you know everything that happens everywhere on the plane and at the destination.

ADDED: I know what I've listed are typical problems, and of course, Professor Dershowitz know what they are, but he's the one who chose to say: "She knows everything."

"The only thing that might make a quiz show seem political is if you’re living in an era where there’s one side of the political spectrum that benefits from depreciating knowledge, the importance of knowledge and fact itself.”

"And I’m afraid that is happening in a lot of fields today. Government policy used to be based on settled scientific consensus in fields — just basic things, like climate is changing, or vaccines help prevent disease. This should just be base-line stuff. And now, apparently, it’s very partisan to believe either of those things. Legal facts like birthright citizenship, or facts from the headlines like who won the 2020 election — these are not just contested things; now they are litmus tests for a certain kind of tribalism, and that’s terrible for a society. A society can’t stand with that kind of disagreement over what is true and what is error, and honestly, one great thing about quiz shows is we are a little microenvironment where these facts do have right answers and wrong answers. And they all get resolved in a matter of seconds. Someone will buzz in, and they are either right or wrong."

Writes Ken Jennings, in "'Jeopardy!' Is a Reminder That Facts Are Fun — and Essential/According to the host Ken Jennings, trivia is overlooked as a 'great social force'" (NYT).

Only "one side of the political spectrum" is "depreciating knowledge, the importance of knowledge and fact itself"? Or does it just seem that way from the point of view of the other side?

And the reason "Jeopardy!” is "a little microenvironment where these facts do have right answers and wrong answers" is because only unquestionable facts can be used as answers on the show. It's not that there isn't other material — facts yet to be nailed down and unknown and unknowable things of all kinds — it's that the other material isn't the stuff of "Jeopardy!" answers.

Yes, it's nice to appreciate the solidity of the facts that do make it onto the answer board, but that's not a basis for maligning the people who doubt and debate about what's true.

"... Mr. Haskell paid $500 to several day laborers to haul away several heavy black plastic trash bags from his home.... When they looked inside one of them, they found human body parts, prompting them to return the bags..."

"... and money to Mr. Haskell, whom they photographed — along with the bags — and reported to the police, prosecutors said. That same afternoon, investigators said, Mr. Haskell was seen in security camera footage removing a trash bag from the trunk of his Tesla and disposing of it in a dumpster in a parking lot in nearby Encino, Calif. A person sifting through the dumpster the next day found a beheaded torso.... During an initial criminal proceeding in December 2023, Mr. Haskell appeared shirtless in court, wearing a smock intended to prevent inmates from using it to hang themselves. At the time, his lawyer told Fox News that the Sheriff’s Department had forced him to appear that way, creating speculation that Mr. Haskell might harm himself...."

From "Son of Ex-Hollywood Agent, Jailed in 3 Murders, Dies by Suicide, D.A. Says/Samuel Haskell, 37, was accused of dismembering his wife and his in-laws. He was the son of Sam Haskell III, an Emmy-winning film producer and veteran talent agent" (NYT).

The father, we're told, "had several A-list clients, including George Clooney, Ray Romano and Whoopi Goldberg," was a producer of "several films and shows about Dolly Parton," and headed "the Miss America Organization until... he resigned amid reports that he and other pageant leaders had made misogynistic and derogatory comments about the competition’s contestants." The link on "resigned" goes to the 2017 HuffPo article, "The Miss America Emails: How The Pageant’s CEO Really Talks About The Winners/Internal correspondence reveals name-calling, slut-shaming and fat-shaming in emails between the Miss America CEO, board members and a pageant writer."

"If a lawyer brought me this file and asked if it was suitable for court, I’d say no. Go back to the source. Do it right. Do a direct export from the original system—no monkey business."

Said Hany Farid, "a professor at UC Berkeley whose research focuses on digital forensics and misinformation."

Quoted in "Metadata Shows the FBI’s ‘Raw’ Jeffrey Epstein Prison Video Was Likely Modified/There is no evidence the footage was deceptively manipulated, but ambiguities around how the video was processed may further fuel conspiracy theories about Epstein’s death" (Wired).

Metadata embedded in the video and analyzed by WIRED and independent video forensics experts shows that rather than being a direct export from the prison’s surveillance system, the footage was modified, likely using the professional editing tool Adobe Premiere Pro. The file appears to have been assembled from at least two source clips, saved multiple times, exported, and then uploaded to the DOJ’s website, where it was presented as 'raw' footage. Experts caution that it’s unclear what exactly was changed, and that the metadata does not prove deceptive manipulation. The video may have simply been processed for public release using available software, with no modifications beyond stitching together two clips. But the absence of a clear explanation for the processing of the file using professional editing software complicates the Justice Department’s narrative...."

If it was manipulated — and still presented as raw — that was done for a reason. What was the reason if not to deceive? You can't say there is "no evidence" of a proposition when there is a basis for inference. If you manipulate to deceive, you try to cover your tracks. Portraying the footage as raw when it is not raw is itself deceit. The question is how far does the deceit go.

The phrase "the metadata does not prove deceptive manipulation" jumps out at me, because it leaves open the proposition that the metadata is probative of deceptive manipulation and certainly doesn't mean that the the metadata proves that there was no deceptive manipulation.

And the phrase "processed for public release" is maddening. What we wanted to see was unprocessed video. Why process it for us? The processing is what makes us suspect manipulation, so it should be the last thing you would want to do. If there were 2 clips, you could give us 2 clips. You didn't need to "stitch" them together. So "no modifications beyond stitching together two clips" sounds fishy.

Finally: "[T]he FBI did not respond to specific questions about the file’s processing, instead referring WIRED to the DOJ. The DOJ in turn referred inquiries back to the FBI and the Bureau of Prisons. The BOP did not respond to a request for comment.... One media forensics expert... put it bluntly: 'It looks suspicious—but not as suspicious as the DOJ refusing to answer basic questions about it.'"

"Mr. Boelter had served on a state economic board with one of the victims, State Senator John A. Hoffman, who survived the shooting, though it is unclear if they actually knew each other."

"Mr. Boelter was appointed to the panel, the Minnesota Governor’s Workforce Development Board, in 2016 by a Democratic former governor, Mark Dayton. The board has 41 members appointed by the governor, and its members try to improve business development in the state. He was later reappointed by Gov. Tim Walz, also a Democrat.... Governor Walz has said that the shooting 'appears to be a politically motivated assassination,' though the exact motive for the attack is not yet clear. Voters do not declare political affiliation when they register in Minnesota, and a state report connected to the work force board listed Mr. Boelter’s affiliation as 'none or other' in 2016. A similar report in 2020 listed him as having 'no party preference.' But David Carlson, a roommate and close friend of Mr. Boelter’s, said Mr. Boelter voted for Donald J. Trump last year and was particularly passionate about opposing abortion...."

From "What We Know About the Minnesota Shooting Suspect/Vance Boelter, who is suspected in the attacks on two Minnesota politicians and their spouses, was taken into custody on Sunday, ending a major manhunt" (NYT).

I believe Carlson said those things after the shootings had taken place.

"U.S. Senator Tina Smith, Democrat of Minnesota, said in an interview that the gunman had a notebook with a list of names that included hers and those of other lawmakers, all of whom were Democrats. The list included about 70 potential targets, a federal law enforcement official said, including doctors, community and business leaders, and locations for Planned Parenthood and other health care centers. Some of the targets were in neighboring states."

Is Tina Smith the only source of this information? What's the basis of her knowledge? And why is the NYT presenting the information like that?

"The F.B.I.’s increasingly pervasive use of the polygraph, or a lie-detector test, has only intensified a culture of intimidation."

"Mr. Patel has wielded the polygraph to keep agents or other employees from discussing a number of topics, including his decision-making or internal moves. Former agents say he is doing so in ways not typically seen in the F.B.I.... Jim Stern, who conducted hundreds of polygraphs while an F.B.I. agent, said... that if someone violated policy, the F.B.I. could polygraph them. But if an agent who legitimately talked to the news media in a previous role had to take one, he said, 'that’s going to be an issue.' 'I never used them to suss out gossip,' he said. At a recent meeting, senior executives were told that the news leaks were increasing in priority — even though they do not involve open cases or the disclosure of classified information. Former officials say senior executives, among others, were being polygraphed at a 'rapid rate.' In May, one senior official was forced out, at least in part because he had not disclosed to Mr. Patel that his wife had taken a knee during demonstrations protesting police violence...."

From "Unease at F.B.I. Intensifies as Patel Ousts Top Officials/Senior executives are being pushed out and the director, Kash Patel, is more freely using polygraph tests to tamp down on news leaks about leadership decisions and behavior" (NYT).

I've made a new tag — "lie detector" — and gone back and applied it to old posts. Interesting to see how many times the topic has come up:

April 2004: "[E]ven if the lie detector was not to be used on [Omarosa], and, indeed, even if lie detector tests are not reliable, if she believed it was to be used on her and believed it was reliable, her running off at the sight of it is some evidence that she had lied in her accusation about the other contestant....."

April 2005:  "Everyone on TV was into analyzing why [the groom-to-be of the Runaway Bride] would take a private lie detector test, but wanted special conditions before he'd take the police test. He wanted it videotaped, and the police refused...."

July 2005: "Some researchers attached sensors to 101 penises and then showed the possessors of these penises either all-male or all-female porn movies. It was kind of a lie detector test, because the men had all professed to being heterosexual, homosexual, or bisexual...."

October 2008: Ashley Todd, the woman who claimed a black man had carved the letter "B" on her face.

June 2012: "'$1.1 million-plus Gates grants: "Galvanic" bracelets that measure student engagement.'... [I]sn't this basically a lie detector? And if so, won't students train themselves to fool the authorities?"

April 2013:

"Just days after giving birth, she returned to work on the Trump campaign, saying she was motivated to forgo maternity leave following the July 13 assassination attempt..."

"I looked at my husband and said, 'Looks like I’m going back to work.... I felt compelled to be present in this historic moment,' she added. 'The president literally put his life on the line to win this election. The least I could do is get back to work quickly."

From "White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt, 27, Addresses Her 'Atypical' 32-Year Age Gap with Husband/Leavitt tied the knot with husband Nicholas Riccio, 59, in January 2025 after welcoming son Niko in 2024" (People). Niko was born on July 10th. Baby (and wedding) pics at the link.

Here's Leavitt at yesterday's press conference. I've cued up the discussion of the auto-pen pardons:

Leavitt: "The president was begging the question that I think a lot of journalists in this room should be asking about whether or not not the former President of the United States — who I think we can all finally agree was cognitively impaired — I know it took people some time to finally admit that but, we all know that to be true, as evidenced by his disastrous debate performance against President Trump during the campaign — I digress on that — but the President was raising the point that: Did the President even know about these pardons? Was his legal signature used without his consent or knowledge?

"The issue of the female aviator’s identity is particularly sensitive as Mr. Trump has also blamed diversity, without evidence, for the crash."

"In addition, Pete Hegseth, the newly confirmed defense secretary, has said that the military has diminished its standards by welcoming women and racial minorities into its ranks. He has echoed Mr. Trump’s comments on rooting out diversity programs in the government.... Mr. Hegseth said on Thursday that the Black Hawk helicopter was 'doing a required annual night evaluation' flight and was being flown by 'a fairly experienced crew.'..."

From "Army Withholds Identity of Helicopter Pilot Killed in Crash/The names of two male crew members were released, but the family of the third aviator requested privacy" (NYT).

The reason the Army gave for withholding the name, we're told, was "her family’s request for privacy." And "It is unclear what specifically motivated the aviator’s family to make the request."

If we had the name, everyone would be able to research her, to read anything she may have written on social media, to look at photographs of her, and to express all sorts of opinions about her, including — taking a cue from Trump — theories about how she was promoted beyond her merit. Her death — and the death of everyone else in the disaster — would merge with the discussion of DEI and Trump's dramatic effort to snuff it out nationwide.

Trump's word: "fight."

I have a simple point to make, but before I do, I want to acknowledge that "fight" was also Hillary Clinton's word, and here we see the music video shown at the 2016 Democratic National Conviction and it's full of celebrities brimming with determination to fight (for what we know they went on to lose):

Trump won in 2016, and he went on to lose — or are you one of the millions who think he won? — in 2020, and now he's fighting to win again. Out there fighting, we know what happened in Butler, Pennsylvania, and we know that "fight" was Trump's word in the most immediate dire moment:

"I say, without evidence, that the media’s Trump qualifiers are backfiring."

A great headline — on a column by Matt Bai, in WaPo.

I know exactly what he's talking about —  even though "Trump qualifiers" is an awkward term — and I'm assuming he's going to articulate my position on the subject... but is he? The subheadline makes me wary:  "We in the news media are making him less accountable for his mendacity, rather than more so." I want you in the news media to be more accountable too. You're just throwing in "without evidence" all the time without establishing that you have honestly assessed whether there is evidence.

Now, I'll read it and make some excerpts and comments as I go:

"When will the press tell us that Democrats 'assert, without evidence,' that Biden has withdrawn?"

Glenn Reynolds quips darkly, linking to something I wrote earlier this morning.

ADDED: Speaking of evidence, Kamala Harris is a first hand witness:

"I am first hand witness that everyday, our president, Joe Biden, fights for the American people, and we are deeply, deeply grateful for his service to the nation."

She is quoted in "Harris: ‘We are deeply grateful’ for Biden’s service/Harris spoke on the South Lawn of the White House for a celebration of NCAA championship teams, filling in for Biden as he recovers from Covid" (Politico).

So she's filling in for him and simultaneously attesting to his daily work, his "fight" for us. The last time we saw him, he was fighting to keep his place as the nominee. KH is a "first hand witness," that is, we're stuck with hearsay.

I have a tag for the word "deeply," and she just said it twice in a row. She must really mean it.

AND: Here's the original post where "deeply" became a tag: "Deeply... it's such a poser word." That's from 2014. There, I made a list of earlier examples of the use of "deeply" in the blog archive. And look what's #1 on the list!

1. "Beauty is a system of power, deeply rooted, preceding all others, richly rewarded," wrote Garace Franke-Ruta, explaining "Why Obama's 'Best-Looking Attorney General' Comment Was a Gaffe."

Obama's 'Best-Looking Attorney General' was, of course, Kamala Harris. 

"He announced it via Twitter... I thought that if Joe Biden was going to do this, he would've announced that he had a presser or..."

"... some sort of big statement that he was going to give from the Oval Office or from the White House somewhere, and that he was going to do that at a preset time later in the evening.... The rest of the world knows that Joe Biden is... totally senile and not in control of his faculties at this point. I mean, when Joe Biden wakes up and someone tells him he's no longer running for president, he's gonna be quite shocked about that. I would assume. I mean, by the way, he could wake up tomorrow and undo this...."

Said Ben Shapiro, in the new episode of his podcast.

So, yeah, what evidence do we have that Joe Biden knows he has given up his candidacy and released the delegates pledged to him? We haven't seen him. He's been sick with Covid. When last we heard from him in person he was defiantly clinging to the candidacy, apparently still believing that he is the one person who can save the world from Donald Trump. We were simply handed written statements.

Shapiro imagines Joe Biden shocked to hear that he's dropped out. He could be shocked because he didn't actually agree to drop out, but he could be shocked because he actually is something like what Ben Shapiro calls "totally senile" and he doesn't remember or understand what he did or supposedly did yesterday. Is his written statement binding? 

Perhaps his people won't tell him he has withdrawn. How would we know? I've read articles about caregivers for persons with dementia that advise us to go along with the errors and not correct all the mistaken beliefs.

He shouldn't be President though, of course, if things are this bad. Couldn't they keep him in Rehoboth and call him Mr. President?

ADDED: I see Trump himself wafted this theory on Truth Social last night:

It’s not over! Tomorrow Crooked Joe Biden’s going to wake up and forget that he dropped out of the race today!

And he repeated the idea this morning:

It’s a new day and Joe Biden doesn’t remember quitting the race yesterday! He is demanding his campaign schedule and arranging talks with Presidents Xi of China, and Putin of Russia, concerning the possible start of World War 3. Biden is “sharp, decisive, energetic, angry, and ready to go!”

"[I]n the hours after the attempted assassination of Donald Trump, we saw J.D. Vance come out with... the most strongly worded of anyone seeking to be his VP."

"Yeah. And it has some factual problems. Here's what he said. He said: "Today [the attempted assassination] is not just some isolated incident. The central premise of the Biden campaign is that President Donald Trump is an authoritarian fascist who must be stopped at all costs. That rhetoric led directly to President Trump's attempted assassination.' We should say there's no evidence that that's true. We don't know the motivations of the shooter. We don't know that he consumed any of that rhetoric or that Vance is even characterizing it correctly.... I think Vance in a lot of ways, kind of embodies the id of Trump and that instinct to fight. And even though these sort of manufactured statements from the campaign are calling for unity and calling for peace, what Trump really wants... is someone who is going to keep fighting, you know, factual or not."

Said Michael C. Bender on yesterday's episode of the NYT "Daily" podcast, "Trump Picks His Running Mate and Political Heir."

AND: This morning, I'm seeing "'They' didn’t shoot Donald Trump/Despite the lack of any clear motive, the actions of Thomas Crooks have been attributed to the Democratic Party at large," by Philip Bump (in WaPo). It's funny to use the passive voice — "actions... have been attributed" — exactly when you are complaining about the amorphous "They." Once again, I think of the Saul Steinberg image:

Find that image in Saul Steinberg's "The Inspector."

Bump writes: "There is no evidence that Crooks shot at Trump because he had been influenced by anti-Trump political rhetoric, and there is no evidence that Crooks was literally or figuratively part of a collective effort to sideline or kill the former president.... There’s no known connection between the known shooter and the broad, nebulous galaxy of opponents Trump and his allies envision.... So Crooks and his actions become abstract. They did it or they facilitated it or they caused it. And, for the purposes of political rhetoric, that will have to suffice."

"How do we in New York reconcile the decisions of law by members of our highest court that seem disconnected with the factual realities around rape and power differentials..."

"... that lead to sexual abuse in the workplace? After this Weinstein decision, how do we give faith to victims that the system can work to hold sexual abusers like Weinstein accountable?"

Asks Cyrus R. Vance Jr. in "What It Takes to Keep Harvey Weinstein, and Men Like Him, Behind Bars" (NYT)(free access link). Vance was the Manhattan D.A. who prosecuted Weinstein.

"Let me preempt the Hamlet routine... around whether Trump will take the stand in his own defense: He shouldn’t, and he won’t."

Writes former prosecutor Elie Honig, in "Will Donald Trump Take the Stand?" (NY Magazine).

We can already see Trump’s subtle but unmistakable retreat from bluster to sanity. At first, Trump boasted that he “would” testify in his own defense. Note the careful word choice: Would, which includes an element of conditionality, isn’t quite the same as will. Days later, he prudently stepped back: “Well, I would if it’s necessary. Right now, I don’t know if you heard about today. Today was just incredible. People are saying — the experts, I’m talking about legal scholars and experts — they’re saying, ‘What kind of a case is this? There is no case.’”...

[Trump has] two ironclad reasons not to testify. 

"Trump defense suggests he was shakedown target, not hush money schemer/During contentious questioning of Stormy Daniels lawyer Keith Davidson, Donald Trump’s lawyers portray their client as the victim in the case."

 A headline at The Washington Post.

In the most contentious testimony yet in the criminal trial, Los Angeles lawyer Keith Davidson denied accusations that he flirted with extortion when he negotiated settlements with celebrities to keep potentially damaging stories out of the public eye.

By accusing him, Trump’s lawyers displayed a key element of their defense strategy: getting jurors to focus on the lawyers and middlemen....

Trump’s lawyers... tried to use Davidson to show that he was well versed in squeezing money out of celebrities, and that Daniels thought her chances of getting paid for her story would vanish after the 2016 presidential election, which she expected Trump to lose.

Fortunately, something of Trump's side of the story is coming out, but I do not trust mainstream media to tell us the story straight. We're not able to watch the trial, and we don't even get a transcript, just whatever the media see fit to report. And yet there seems to be this idea — among the Trump antagonists — that we the voters will allow this trial to substantially manipulate our opinion of the man. The case was brought to manipulate us. The presidential election is at stake. Give us a transcript. 

[CORRECTION: Even though I read the news every day, I had not noticed that the New York court system announced, back on April 22, that it would provide transcripts: "The court system is taking the novel step of posting the daily transcripts of the trial proceedings on its public website.... 'With current law restricting the broadcasting of trial proceedings and courtroom space for public spectators very limited, the release of the daily transcripts on the court system’s website is the best way to provide the public a direct view of the proceedings in this historic trial,' said Chief Administrative Judge Zayas."]

Back to the WaPo account of Trump's lawyer, Emil Bove, cross-examining Davidson:

"Keith Davidson, the former lawyer for the porn star Stormy Daniels, faced a blistering cross-examination... with defense lawyers casting him as a serial extortionist of celebrities."

The NYT reports.

Mr. Trump said he hated the deal with Ms. Daniels.... Prosecutors played the recording for the jury, letting them hear Mr. Cohen tell Mr. Davidson that Mr. Trump hated “the fact that we did it,” referring to the hush-money payment to Ms. Daniels....

They shouldn't write "Mr. Trump said he hated the deal with Ms. Daniels" when the evidence is only that Cohen said he hated "the fact that we did it."

Quite aside from whether the fact that they did the deal is different from the deal, all we know is that Cohen said Trump hated it.  They should have to write something like Cohen said that Trump said he hated making the deal. Cohen could have been lying.

"In 1877 a British philosopher and mathematician named William Kingdon Clifford published an essay called 'The Ethics of Belief.'"

"In it he argued that if a shipowner ignored evidence that his craft had problems and sent the ship to sea having convinced himself it was safe, then of course we would blame him if the ship went down and all aboard were lost. To have a belief is to bear responsibility, and one thus has a moral responsibility to dig arduously into the evidence, avoid ideological thinking and take into account self-serving biases. 'It is wrong always, everywhere, and for anyone, to believe anything upon insufficient evidence,' Clifford wrote. A belief, he continued, is a public possession. If too many people believe things without evidence, 'the danger to society is not merely that it should believe wrong things, though that is great enough; but that it should become credulous, and lose the habit of testing things and inquiring into them; for then it must sink back into savagery.'"

From "The Courage to Follow the Evidence on Transgender Care" by David Brooks (NYT).

Here's the essay "The Ethics of Belief."

And here's Hilary Cass's study (discussed in the Brooks column), "Independent Review of Gender Identity Services for Children and Young People."

"I’ve cried and prayed every night for over six years straight that I would remain a free Black woman."

"I was thrown into this fight for voting rights and will keep swinging to ensure no one else has to face what I’ve endured for over six years, a political ploy where minority voting rights are under attack."

Said Crystal Mason, quoted in "Woman Who Received 5-Year Sentence in Voter Fraud Case Is Acquitted/A Texas appeals court reversed its earlier opinion that had upheld the conviction of Crystal Mason, who was found guilty of illegally casting a provisional ballot in 2016, even though she claimed she hadn’t known she was ineligible to vote" (NYT).

Mason, a convicted felon, was ineligible to vote, and the question was whether the prosecution needed to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that she knew she was ineligible.

Was Mason used in a political ploy? Did blackness matter? She says yes to both questions, and your opinion may depend on whether you're a Republican or a Democrat. If so, doesn't that tend to prove it was a political ploy? But who has the burden of proof on that? Nobody. And no one will ever definitively answer that question. You already know what you believe. And in that fog, who wants to see Crystal Mason spend 5 years in prison? Not the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals.

"I have seen claims on social media saying that semen retention can boost your testosterone levels, cure erectile dysfunction, make you more manly..."

"... make you stronger, cure depression, make you more successful, clear your skin.... And there is no medical evidence that it does any of those things."

Says Ashley Winter, "a urologist who has been publicly critical of nofap ideas," quoted in "Masturbation abstinence is popular online. Doctors and therapists are worried" (NPR).

The experts are worried — worried about respect for their authority. But whether there is "medical evidence" or not, individuals will experiment with their own body and mind and observe the results and make their own choices.