N.J.'s Judges Humiliate America.

January 14, 2011 at 3:25 P.M. "Error" inserted since my previous review will now be corrected from a public computer.

January 8, 2011 at 10:59 A.M. Hackers have deactivated and totally disabled my security system for which I am paying a lot of money. I am unable to restore that security system. I surmise that this computer crime involves the use of government resources. Probably the same people stealing the money I paid for the ISBN number on my second book -- which is suppressed -- are now responsible for this computer crime. I will write almost exclusively from public computers. I will not stop commenting on criminal actions by New Jersey officials. ("Does Senator Menendez Have Mafia Friends?" and "How Censorship Works in America.")

Friday, January 21, 2011 from 6:00 P.M. to 9:00 P.M. at "La Pregunta Arts Cafe," 1528 Amsterdam Ave., Manhattan (135th/136th St.) Admission: $10.00. There will be a gathering to support the struggle for justice of Mumia Abu-Jamal and many others unjustly convicted in the criminal justice system. I have nothing to do with any organization or funds involved in this effort. I plan to pay my $10.00 so as to join the others there that evening. Please help in this fight for political freedom. ("Freedom for Mumia Abu-Jamal" and "Mumia Abu-Jamal and the Unconstitutionality of the Death Penalty.")

January 7, 2011 at 10:52 P.M. Perhaps the insertions of "errors" in this essay are related to several breaking corruption scandals in New Jersey: "Guilty Plea in Scam to Defraud Schools," in The Record, January 6, 2011, at p. A-1. (Supplemental investigations in Union and Hudson Counties are also rumored to be on the verge of "breaking." Arrests and subpoenas are forthcoming, allegedly. Mr. Torricelli?)

January 7, 2011 at 9:25 P.M. "Errors" were inserted since this afternoon. I cannot say how many other writings have been vandalized. I have now corrected these inserted "errors." ("Roberto Unger's Revolutionary Legal System" and "America's Holocaust.")

January 6, 2011 at 3:21 P.M. My computer was turned off from a remote location. This was immediately after I posted the essay which appears below. I will continue to write from multiple public computers. ("How Censorship Works in America" and "What is it like to be censored in America?")

I.

America's judiciary is under intense attack from the political branches of government. This may be described as an external assault on the courts. More worrisome is an entirely internal process of disintegration within America's courts and legal profession. In what follows I will comment, briefly, on these related phenomena. My sources are listed at the conclusion of this essay.

Compounding the troubles of America's judges is the decline of intellectual ability and scholarship among many members of the judiciary. This decline is partly a result of politicizing the selection process for judges to an extent that is unprecedented in our history. No doubt this decline in the intellectual quality of the nation's legal "work-product" is another result of America's rampant anti-intellectualism.

It must be said, also, that there is a deliberate turning away from values questions -- as distinct from sociological or legislative presumptions -- together with the loss of cultural sophistication among lawyers and judges. This development is unique to the U.S. legal system and is often obscured by discussions of "pragmatism" in adjudication or public administration. (See Ronald Dworkin's essay on Richard Posner's jurisprudence listed below.)

Perhaps at no moment in American history have judges been so visibly lacking in intellectual power or (worse) in the courage to face the Constitutional crises that we must overcome. The challenge to America's "security" posed by international terrorism calls upon forces within society that threaten a fragile network of compromises guaranteeing our civil liberties and most fundamental rights. This is a jurisprudential dilemma. Security is pitted against liberty and justice, except that these are entangled values whose balance defines America's identity. We cannot surrender one of these values for the sake of the others. I refer the reader to the works of Charles Fried identified in my list of sources.

The talents rewarded among America's legal experts today are essentially diplomatic or political, whereas we require exceptional juridical acumen at this stage in our Revolutionary odyssey. Being a politician and judicial skills are not always compatible or found in the same person. Political skills may be the opposite of what is most needed by judges actually deciding these controversies concerning fundamental values.

I define the external crisis afflicting the courts, therefore, as the deliberate effort -- sometimes by non-lawyers unaware of the perils of the enterprise -- to eliminate judicial independence. At risk in this effort is the principled basis for the Supreme Court's landmark decision in Marburry v. Madison. Judges are being told what the law is rather than deciding the matter for the other branches. Who is deciding what is the law? Money. Money "buys" politicians in Congress and elected officials then "confirm" judicial appointees who "won't rock the boat."

The goal for many legislators has become to ensure that judicial appointees are obedient soldiers in America's ideological wars, whether for one side or the other. Republicans fight for their "guys and gals" to be confirmed; Democrats struggle to get their "boys and girls" into key "spots." I suggest that this role of political foot-soldier is the opposite of the judicial task.

Judges must protect core principles of America's Constitutional democracy through vindications of the rights of persons, often the least powerful persons in our society who have no other "lobbyists" or protectors in the system. To deny this protection to ordinary people in a "forum of principle" is to create a system with different levels of legal status -- or hierarchies of rights bearers -- allowing some persons' rights to be deemed "superior" to the rights of most others based on wealth or influence.

Being rich does not give a person a morally superior claim to justice in American society as distinct from the practical means by which to obtain justice or manipulate the system. Maybe this explains some of my recent experiences with sanctioned computer crimes. ("How Censorship Works in America" and "I Affirm This Single moment of Rebellion.")

This legal class division is not in keeping with the spirit of the Framers' vision, I contend, nor is it compatible with the only logical interpretation of the juridical scheme set forth in the text of the Constitution and (to coin a phrase) within the "penumbra" of Americans' enumerated rights.

The Framers intended to create a society with no entrenched class system or landed aristocracy of any kind, a nation of citizens and equals before the law endowed with inviolable fundamental rights, including freedom of speech and religion, privacy and due process of law. At any difficult moment in America's history -- especially in war time -- the Bill of Rights may be unpopular and judges protecting such rights for persons may also be unpopular. Nevertheless, the function entrusted to judges is theirs alone and cannot be abdicated or delegated away in our system. Each time an "error" is inserted in my writings with the assistance of government the Constitution is violated. ("What is it like to be censored in America?" and "Censorship and Cruelty in New Jersey.")

This exclusivity of legal power is true even when discharging judicial responsibility is onerous and frightening for individuals "acting" as judges. In the stage play of America's Constitutional system, judges must play the leading role. Judges in many countries -- Italy, for example -- have knowingly risked their lives to fulfill this solemn duty of applying the law fairly to persons. In the past, America's judges have been equally fearless about upholding the law while protecting legal rights. There is no legally valid form of torture in America. No one is a slave in this country. Equality means that men and women are and must be equals before the law in their rights and with regard to the respect to which they are entitled as persons. There is no legally valid political censorship in America. ("Is there a gay marriage right?")

Polls indicate that a majority of Americans approve of abolishing the Bill of Rights "if necessary" to win the "War on Terror." To abolish the Bill of Rights means that terror wins that war. The Constitution is the homeland that we defend in America. At the moment -- at least on-line -- the First Amendment has been made irrelevant when it comes to the expression of controversial political opinions by powerless dissidents, like me. ("More Censorship and Cybercrime.")

At the federal level, Republicans may be the worst offenders in the effort to politicize the judiciary. The very concept of principles of Constitutional doctrine that transcend outcomes in specific cases or controversies is, literally, incomprehensible to some politicians in Washington. At the state level, Democrats have developed "machines" designed to ensure that their access to power becomes nearly impossible to challenge, thus obtaining control of courts and police departments as part of their "lock on power."

New Jersey is the most spectacular example of this Democrat corruption where dirty politics is compounded with organized crime's influence on the mechanisms of government. What the law is becomes trivial in deciding cases as opposed to "Who do you know?" or "Who is backing your application?" or "How much can you pay for the result you want?"

New Jersey judges are said by lawyers to "belong to" specific political bosses. I will be delighted to recall conversations with prominent members of the bar dealing with this issue. The "bosses" are usually Democrats. Their judges are "on the leash." ("George E. Norcross, III is the Boss of New Jersey Courts and Politics" and "Senator Bob, the Babe, and the Big Bucks" then "Law and Ethics in the Soprano State.")

Crime bosses were (and are) among the behind-the-scenes operators "calling the shots" in Garden State courts regardless of the merits of controversies or content of laws. These mafia figures -- or so-called "real governors" of the state -- tell justices and judges or prosecutors "what's what," as they say in Trenton, New Jersey. ("Stuart Rabner and Conduct Unbecoming to the Judiciary in New Jersey" and "No More Cover-Ups and Lies, Chief Justice Rabner!")

Mr. Obama's appointments to the federal bench are delayed because Republicans are staging a holding-action, refusing to vote on confirmations as payback for Democrats' stalling Mr. Bush's nominees. The law is merely contested territory that can be made to mean "whatever we want it to mean." After all, "everything is relative." ("Why I am not an ethical relativist.")

Everybody is a realist now. All legal players have become adept at what Critical Legal Scholars (CLS) call "trashing." Political wars over the judiciary and new laws -- laws usually drafted by lobbyists affected by them -- are too often about status or ego, usually these wars are fought at the expense of a Constitution and legal system that is quickly collapsing from its own contradictions. Among those contradictions is a society committed to freedom of speech that sanctions computer crime and censorship of dissidents, like me. ("Duncan Kennedy, Peter Gable, and Critical Legal Studies" and "Roberto Unger's Revolutionary Legal Theory.")

America's legal system is obese and subject to the strictures of Michelle Obama's campaign for "healthier waistlines." The extra girth has caused the legal structure to suffer from chronic ailments. The administration of laws has become lethargic and non-reactive to street-level realities. The American legal system is a patient dying, painfully, from stress. This mortal condition has created an internal crisis of incivility and lost collegiality, treachery and mutual thefts or underminings that characterizes the judiciary. Things are worse among practitioners.

The "bottom line" is the catastrophe that is the "Soprano State." Surprisingly, skills are declining among appellate judges, but the signs of Constitutional suicide are visible among all members of a Balkanized practice and even in legal academia where divisions, back-stabbing (sometimes "front-stabbing"!), are routine and no longer shocking realities. The legal ethics process has become a political weapon to be used against enemies or ideological adversaries that is controlled by politicians exempting themselves from the rules. ("Does Senator Menendez Have Mafia Friends?" and "New Jersey's 'Ethical' Legal System" then "Jennifer Velez is a 'Dyke Magnet!'")

Lawyers who don't play ball get shafted. I don't play ball. Let us see where this combination of factors is taking America's legal system as we enter the second decade of a new century. ("America's Holocaust" and "Freedom for Mumia Abu-Jamal.")

II.

"In New Jersey's strangest current political soap opera, Monday's episode played out like this: the judge (who refuses to judge) said he was leaving, the governor (who nominates) refuses to nominate, and the Senate (which confirms) refuses to confirm. Got that?"

The puzzled New York Times columnist was not alone in his consternation and anger.

"The running battle over who will sit on the State Supreme Court [sic.] continues to take precedent [sic.] -- defying terms, and seems poised to leave the court with just five of the usual seven justices" -- even though as many as nine persons may claim some right to "sit" as N.J. justices! -- "plus one or two fill-ins. The fight, now eight months old, pits the Republican governor, Chris Christie, against the Democratic majority in the Senate, with members of the court drawn into the fray."

Justices have been reduced to the status of stooges for the politicians staging a media war. Perhaps this stooge-status explains the continuing computer crimes committed against me, publicly, and the fear as well as paralysis among mediocrities, like Mr. Rabner or Ms. Dow, unable to do anything about the situation. This situation can only be described as defecation on the Bill of Rights by "bosses' beyond the reach of the law:

"The increasingly convoluted dispute might be entertaining, in the cringe-inducing way that New Jersey politics often are, but legal scholars say the stakes are serious." ("New Jersey's Legal System is a Whore House.")

A number of persons wonder whether Stuart Rabner (under the name "Daniel Mendelsohn") may have plagiarized and been paid for my review of "Brideshead Revisited" in an article appearing in the Epsteins' periodical, The New York Review of Books. I cannot say because I do not know. ("What is it like to be plagiarized?" and "'Brideshead Revisited': A Movie Review.")

It is likely that Mr. Rabner and Ms. Milgram were among my interlocutors at "The Philosophy Cafe." These distinguished legal thinkers were probably dismayed to be defeated in debates against me. They may have shared in the effort to destroy that MSN group or to deny my access to MSN groups today. Animosity and resentment at my humble intellectual achievements, such as they are, seem to have something to do with continuing unpunished censorship as well as computer crime to which I have alluded. ("Little Brown Men Are Only Objects For Us" and "What is it like to be tortured?" then "An Open Letter to My Torturers in New Jersey, Terry Tuchin and Diana Lisa Riccioli.")

" ... 'I fear that it begins to detract from the perception of the court's legitimacy,' said Ronald K. Chen, vice dean [sic.] of the Rutgers University Law School." ("New Jersey's Feces-Covered Supreme Court" and, again, "New Jersey's Legal System is a Whore House.")

Legitimacy was sacrificed by this tribunal some time ago: Ms. Poritz may have traded judicial favors for lesbian sex; Mr. Rabner was either negligent or corrupt in allowing for the release of Mr. Prisco, the alleged "Godfather" from Bayonne; Ms. LaVecchia was involved in an obvious "conflict of interest" that gave rise to the "appearance of impropriety" in violation of the Canons of Judicial Ethics and the disappearance of $300 MILLION. Furthermore, Mr. Rivera-Soto was sanctioned by his esteemed colleagues for behaviors brought to the "attention" of the court as a result of behind-the-back tactics, possibly involving Mr. Rivera-Soto's judicial brethren. Has Rivera-Soto's computer been damaged? Do you speak to me of "ethics" as you commit computer crimes against me, New Jersey? ("Law and Ethics in the Soprano State.")

No wonder Justice Rivera-Soto has decided to, as it were, "cut out" of the scene. Mr. Rivera-Soto is leaving his position as New Jersey Supreme Court justice in June, 2011. This is true even though Mr. Rivera-Soto may be entirely correct concerning the unconstitutionality of Chief Justice Rabner's "appointment" of Mr. Stern to fill a vacancy on the Trenton court. You have to hand it to New Jersey's so-called "Jewish mafia." I can neither confirm nor deny that there is a "Jewish mafia" or such a thing as "Kosher criminality" in New Jersey. Solomon Dwek? ("44 Political and Legal Officials Arrested in New Jersey.")

Rabner will get away with his actions -- maybe the crimes committed against me will not be punished -- because New Jersey is "run by the mafia." This wisdom was passed on to me by lawyers and judges. If this is true -- if New Jersey is mob territory without meaningful laws -- then it can only be described as a failed jurisdiction. ("Mafia Influence in New Jersey Law and Politics" and "Anne Milgram Does it Again!")

The rest of the state's legal system and judiciary may be even worse than the soiled Supreme Court in Trenton which is laughable and embarassing to lawyers in New Jersey and America. The Garden State's legal system has been lost to graft and cronyism, mafia influence and nepotism. Rabner's usurpation of unconstitutional appointment powers is only the latest example of brazen lawlessness winked at when committed by members of the "club." For a glimpse of New Jersey's federal judiciary, see "Anthony Suarez Goes on Trial" and "Anthony Suarez Gets a Walk."

It is rumored that former U.S. Senator Robert Torricelli has visited my sites. I cannot confirm this fact nor do I know whether Mr. Torricelli has been involved in the computer wars against me. The precise relationship between Mr. Torricelli and Diana Lisa Riccioli, if any, or what services Ms. Riccioli "performed" for the disgraced former N.J. Senator and current lobbyist for Taiwan are not known to me. Has Mr. Torricelli inserted text in the Times attacking China or for any purpose? (Get set for more computer attacks when this gets posted!)

At a national level, the federal judiciary is also in trouble: "[Chief Justice] Roberts is right to be concerned that mounting federal court vacancies are creating crushing case-loads in some jurisdictions [New Jersey] and hampering the courts' ability to fulfill their vital role. Given his office, we understand why he [Mr. Roberts] did not point a partisan finger in his report."

Mr. Roberts has been called the "ultimate loyal Republican." Much the same may be said of Mr. Rabner, perhaps, and Ms. Poritz for sure. These are the people attending the decades-old legislative hearings misleadingly described as the Abbott case while "judging" the ethics of their alleged "inferiors," like me. I am not alone in being "underwhelmed" by New Jersey's jurists:

"[Mr. Roberts] diluted his message a bit by suggesting that blame for this undermining of the judiciary rests with both parties. ..." ("What is Law?")

The liberal establishment's "newspaper of record" blames the Republicans. When a legal and political system fails to function in order to address the greatest crises faced by society, or for the benefit of most people subject to the laws of a state, that system must be described as a failed system.

If it is now indisputably true that New Jersey may be so described -- as a failed state -- then will we have to wait long for the same disease to afflict Washington, D.C. and for the rot to set into the federal court system? I think not. Please deal with New Jersey's legal problems, Mr. Roberts. Mr. Christie? There must be something that you gentlemen can do about this most visible spectacle of censorship and cruelty, incompetence and theft. ("How Censorship Works in America" and "New Jersey is the Home of the Living Dead.")

New Jersey's legal system has failed, disastrously and publicly, to protect the rights of residents or to achieve justice in the vast majority of cases. Ignoring the problem (or turning off my computer or destroying my security system) will not help the situation, Mr. Rabner. Daily insertions of "errors' in my texts in violation of copyright law and the First Amendment merely confirm my allegations against the most corrupt state in the union.

Do the right thing, Mr. Rabner, resign from the court that you have disgraced and from your membership in the New Jersey Bar Association immediately. Shame on all of you.

Sources:

Periodicals:

Slaman Masood, "Political Killing Leads to Turmoil Within Pakistan: Assassination by Guard," in The New York Times, January 5, 2011, at p. A1. (Taliban close to power in Pakistan.)
"There He Goes Again," (Editorial) in The New York Times, January 5, 2011, at p. A22. ("Nino.")
Richard Perez-Pena, "New Tangle in Battle Over the Court in Trenton," in The New York Times, January 4, 2011, at p. A17. (Circus or Brothel?)
Salman Masood, "Pakistan: Prime Minister Struggles to Keep Government Intact," in The New York Times, January 4, 2011, at p. A10. (Good Luck.)
John Leland, "2 Americans Die in Iraq; Local Forces Are Attacked," in The New York Times, January 4, 2011, at p. A8. (Iraq is heating up, again.)
"The Missing Judges," (Editorial) in The New York Times, January 4, 2011, at p. A20. (Federal judicial crisis.)
Roger Parloff, "The Rigorous Mind of Chief Justice John Roberts," in Fortune, January 14-February 14, 2011, at p. 62. http://www.fortune.com/ (I doubt that Mr. Roberts' writings are altered, censored, or suppressed by hackers.)
David Cole, "Breaking Away: Obama's War on Terror is Not 'Bush Lite,'" in The New Republic, December 30, 2011, at p. 17. (" ... if the president claims the authority to execute Americans without any judicial oversight, surely we the people are entitled to understand the criteria and the process for using such an awesome power before it is exercised.")

Books:

Ronald Dworkin, A Matter of Principle (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1985).
Ronald Dworkin, "Pragmatism and Law," in Justice in Robes (Cambridge: Harvrad University Press, 2006), pp. 36-49.
Charles Fried, Order & Law (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1991).
Bob Ingle & Sandy McLure, The Soprano State: New Jersey's Culture of Corruption (New York: St. Martin's, 2008). (An American jurisdiction turned over to the Gambino crime family?)
Mark Tushnet, Red, White, and Blue: A Critical Analysis of Constitutional Law (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1988).