No Mr President, We are Not tired of winning. Keep 'em coming, and thank you.
Reuters
10/29/2018
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. President Donald Trump’s administration took action on Monday to cut off a Chinese state-backed chipmaker from U.S. suppliers amid allegations the firm stole intellectual property from U.S. semiconductor company Micron Technology Inc (MU.O)
The Commerce Department said it had put Fujian Jinhua Integrated Circuit Co Ltd on a list of entities that cannot buy components, software and technology goods from U.S. firms.
The administration is concerned the Chinese firm could flood the market with cheap chips that are also made by U.S. companies that supply the U.S. military. If the U.S. chipmakers go out of business, the military would lose a supplier for an item that must come from the United States.
read more
.
Wednesday, October 31, 2018
China factory growth weakest in over two years, slump in export orders deepens
Reuters
10/31/2018
BEIJING (Reuters) - China’s manufacturing sector in October expanded at its weakest pace in over two years, hurt by slowing domestic and external demand, in a sign of deepening cracks in the economy from an intensifying trade war with the United States.
Anxiety about China’s cooling growth and its likely drag on the global economy have vexed financial markets recently, and Wednesday’s official Purchasing Managers’ Index (PMI) indicates more stress for investors through coming months.
The official PMI - which gives global investors their first look at business conditions in China at the start of the last quarter of the year - fell to 50.2 in October, the lowest since July 2016 and down from 50.8 in September.
read more
10/31/2018
BEIJING (Reuters) - China’s manufacturing sector in October expanded at its weakest pace in over two years, hurt by slowing domestic and external demand, in a sign of deepening cracks in the economy from an intensifying trade war with the United States.
Anxiety about China’s cooling growth and its likely drag on the global economy have vexed financial markets recently, and Wednesday’s official Purchasing Managers’ Index (PMI) indicates more stress for investors through coming months.
The official PMI - which gives global investors their first look at business conditions in China at the start of the last quarter of the year - fell to 50.2 in October, the lowest since July 2016 and down from 50.8 in September.
read more
Tuesday, October 30, 2018
U.S. charges Chinese intelligence officers for jet engine data hack
reuters
10/31/2018
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Chinese intelligence officers conspired with hackers and company insiders to break into private companies’ computer systems and steal information on a turbo fan engine used in commercial jetliners, according to a U.S. indictment unsealed on Tuesday.
The indictment said at the time of the hacks, a Chinese-state owned aerospace company was working to develop a comparable engine for use in aircraft manufactured in China and in other countries.
Chinese-made jets, including the C919 and ARJ21, currently use foreign engines but the country has been trying to develop a competitive homegrown alternative.
read more
10/31/2018
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Chinese intelligence officers conspired with hackers and company insiders to break into private companies’ computer systems and steal information on a turbo fan engine used in commercial jetliners, according to a U.S. indictment unsealed on Tuesday.
The indictment said at the time of the hacks, a Chinese-state owned aerospace company was working to develop a comparable engine for use in aircraft manufactured in China and in other countries.
Chinese-made jets, including the C919 and ARJ21, currently use foreign engines but the country has been trying to develop a competitive homegrown alternative.
read more
U.S. Navy chief says U.S, China to 'meet more and more on high seas'
reuters
10/31/2018
JAKARTA (Reuters) - Chief of U.S. Naval Operations Admiral John Richardson said on Tuesday the United States and China “will meet each other more and more on the high seas” after a Chinese warship came close to a U.S. ship in the disputed South China Sea.
The Chinese vessel came within 45 yards (meters) of the USS Decatur during a “freedom of navigation” sail in late September, U.S. Vice President Mike Pence said this month.
The U.S. mission was the latest attempt to counter what Washington sees as Beijing’s efforts to limit freedom of navigation in the strategic waters, where Chinese, Japanese and some Southeast Asian navies operate.
read more
10/31/2018
JAKARTA (Reuters) - Chief of U.S. Naval Operations Admiral John Richardson said on Tuesday the United States and China “will meet each other more and more on the high seas” after a Chinese warship came close to a U.S. ship in the disputed South China Sea.
The Chinese vessel came within 45 yards (meters) of the USS Decatur during a “freedom of navigation” sail in late September, U.S. Vice President Mike Pence said this month.
The U.S. mission was the latest attempt to counter what Washington sees as Beijing’s efforts to limit freedom of navigation in the strategic waters, where Chinese, Japanese and some Southeast Asian navies operate.
read more
Monday, October 29, 2018
Gun Confiscation Hasn’t Helped D.C. Crime Rate
Bearing Arms
Posted at 8:30 am on October 28, 2018 by Tom Knighton
Gun control advocates routinely argue that gun control laws will reduce crime, that they take guns out of the hands of criminals. Gun rights advocates typically counter with plenty of examples of places with sky-high crime and lots of gun laws. This tends to not go over well with people who get their knowledge of firearms policy from MSNBC.
It doesn’t go over well because it’s true and they’re not prepared for that.
Kind of like how they won’t be prepared to see how gun confiscation hasn’t really helped the District of Columbia.
D.C. police can curtail the illegal carrying of firearms like they are as much as they want, but most murders aren’t spur of the moment things. They’re either planned or part of another crime. No one just walks down the street while carrying a gun and decides, “You know what? I’m going to kill this guy.”
Now, there are exceptions. Only a fool would argue otherwise. However, those exceptions are irrelevant.
What is relevant is that despite aggressive anti-gun actions by local police, the kind of thing anti-gunners want to see happen in every city in the nation, the crime rate isn’t dropping. It’s going up. Why?
Probably because the focus is all wrong.
In this case, the focus is all about the gun. That’s wrong. As noted above and a trillion times before, guns aren’t responsible for anything. They’re simply tools. By focusing on the tool used and not the tools using them, they’re ignoring the actual problem which is the number of violent people in and around the D.C. area.
Thank You Mr Knighton and Bearing Arms
Also via Bearing Arms:
At least former fellow-traveler Cameron Kasky figured that out.
Hogg, however, hasn’t.
In a video, he commented that he believes gun control should have been addressed centuries ago.
Townhall‘s Katie Pavlich gave the perfect response to that.
Posted at 8:30 am on October 28, 2018 by Tom Knighton
Gun control advocates routinely argue that gun control laws will reduce crime, that they take guns out of the hands of criminals. Gun rights advocates typically counter with plenty of examples of places with sky-high crime and lots of gun laws. This tends to not go over well with people who get their knowledge of firearms policy from MSNBC.
It doesn’t go over well because it’s true and they’re not prepared for that.
Kind of like how they won’t be prepared to see how gun confiscation hasn’t really helped the District of Columbia.
Few police departments are better at confiscating illegal guns than Washington, D.C.’s Metropolitan Police Department, according to a new report from NPR. But that aggressive gun-confiscation policy hasn’t done anything to curb the ballooning homicide rate in the nation’s capital, which has risen over 40 percent since last year.
Every American police department encourages its officers to be on the lookout for illegal guns, but D.C. has instituted a program that tasks teams of officers in unmarked cars to scour the streets in search of people who might be carrying illegal firearms.
D.C. officers frequently stop pedestrians and pull cars over when they observe an individual looking nervous when they drive past. They’ve also stopped and searched people for crossing the street, running away, wearing heavy coats in warm weather, or holding their pants in a certain way while walking, according to NRP.Of course, as noted in the Guns America post, there’s more at work in firearm-related crime than the firearm itself. Triggers don’t pull themselves, after all. Someone has to operate the gun, and that is where the problem really is.
…
So, do fewer guns “on the street” result in less crime? Not so much. While the homicide rate dropped between 2015 and 2017, so far this year there have been more homicides than the entirety of last year and the same number as in 2016 (135). That number is driven largely by firearm-related crime, which accounted for 77 percent of homicides in 2016.
D.C. police can curtail the illegal carrying of firearms like they are as much as they want, but most murders aren’t spur of the moment things. They’re either planned or part of another crime. No one just walks down the street while carrying a gun and decides, “You know what? I’m going to kill this guy.”
Now, there are exceptions. Only a fool would argue otherwise. However, those exceptions are irrelevant.
What is relevant is that despite aggressive anti-gun actions by local police, the kind of thing anti-gunners want to see happen in every city in the nation, the crime rate isn’t dropping. It’s going up. Why?
Probably because the focus is all wrong.
In this case, the focus is all about the gun. That’s wrong. As noted above and a trillion times before, guns aren’t responsible for anything. They’re simply tools. By focusing on the tool used and not the tools using them, they’re ignoring the actual problem which is the number of violent people in and around the D.C. area.
Thank You Mr Knighton and Bearing Arms
Also via Bearing Arms:
Katie Pavlich Lays Smackdown on David Hogg
David Hogg needs to come to understand that just because some people he went to school with were shot, he’s not an expert on anything relating to guns, gun control, the Second Amendment, or anything else. Tragic as Parkland was, it didn’t mystically convey wisdom to either him or any of his cohorts.At least former fellow-traveler Cameron Kasky figured that out.
Hogg, however, hasn’t.
In a video, he commented that he believes gun control should have been addressed centuries ago.
Townhall‘s Katie Pavlich gave the perfect response to that.
It was: July 4, 1776 🇺🇸 https://t.co/9kTsoajAUM— Katie Pavlich (@KatiePavlich) October 23, 2018
Saturday, October 27, 2018
Friday, October 26, 2018
Shall We Add A Little Lithium To The Water Supply?
Mind Control Tops U.S. Healthcare Spending
zerohedge
Tyler Durden Fri, 10/26/2018 - 20:45
A Tufts psychology professor and Harvard Medical School lecturer has recommended dosing US water supplies with the lithium in order to reduce suicide rates, saving an estimated 15,000 - 25,000 lives per year.
Appearing on the Vox podcast "Future Perfect," psychiatrist and researcher Dr. Nassir Ghaemi, MD explains that a 2014 review he co-authored analyzing five studies concluded that areas of the country with higher levels of naturally occurring lithium in the water supply had lower suicide rates. Areas with particularly high concentrations have as much as a 50 to 60 percent reduction.
"In general, in the United States, lithium levels are much higher in the Northeast and East Coast and very low in the Mountain West," Ghaemi told Vox, adding "And suicide rates track that exactly — much lower suicide rates in the Northeast, and the highest rates of suicide are in the Mountain West."
While Ghaemi is confident in the life-saving effects of making everybody comfortably numb, several other studies have placed the possible positive effects at minimal to nil.
That said, Vox's Dylan Matthews writes: "At the very least, I’d love for some governments to conduct real, bona fide experiments on lithium. Maybe a state could randomly add lithium to some of its reservoirs but not others, or, conversely, a high-lithium state could try removing it from the water. There are serious ethical questions about doing experiments like this that affect whole populations, but if lithium’s effect is real and we don’t pursue it because we lack compelling enough evidence, thereby endangering thousands of people — that’s an ethical problem too."
In other words, we should go ahead and just try dosing a few populations to see what happens!
Thank You Mr Durden and Zerohedge.
Burt Gummer said it best to 2 Govt spooks who wanted to save the monster and "Research" it into a bio weapon in Tremors 6, Cold Day In Hell.
"Malevolent Ineptoids."
zerohedge
Tyler Durden Fri, 10/26/2018 - 20:45
A Tufts psychology professor and Harvard Medical School lecturer has recommended dosing US water supplies with the lithium in order to reduce suicide rates, saving an estimated 15,000 - 25,000 lives per year.
Appearing on the Vox podcast "Future Perfect," psychiatrist and researcher Dr. Nassir Ghaemi, MD explains that a 2014 review he co-authored analyzing five studies concluded that areas of the country with higher levels of naturally occurring lithium in the water supply had lower suicide rates. Areas with particularly high concentrations have as much as a 50 to 60 percent reduction.
"In general, in the United States, lithium levels are much higher in the Northeast and East Coast and very low in the Mountain West," Ghaemi told Vox, adding "And suicide rates track that exactly — much lower suicide rates in the Northeast, and the highest rates of suicide are in the Mountain West."
Experts don't agreeIf you apply that 50 to 60 percent reduction to the US, where about 45,000 people total died by suicide in 2016, you get a total number of lives saved at around 22,500 to 27,000 a year. That’s likely too high, since you can’t reduce suicide rates in places that are already high-lithium. Ghaemi’s own back-of-the-envelope calculation is that we’d save 15,000 to 25,000.Ghaemi and a number of other eminent psychiatrists are making a pretty remarkable claim. They think we could save tens of thousands of lives a year with a very simple, low-cost intervention: putting small amounts of lithium, amounts likely too small to have significant side effects, into our drinking water, the way we put fluoride in to protect our teeth. -Vox
While Ghaemi is confident in the life-saving effects of making everybody comfortably numb, several other studies have placed the possible positive effects at minimal to nil.
In response to the new studies, the Open Philanthropy Project has said that the Danish study "makes us substantially less optimistic" that trace amounts of lithium actually reduce suicides. Meanwhile, another study using health care claims in teh US found that more lithium in the water doesn't translate to lower diagnoses of dimentia or bipolar disorder.In 2015, the Open Philanthropy Project, a large-scale grantmaking group in San Francisco, shared an analysis with me implying that if two specific studies were right, a “small increase in the amount of trace lithium in drinking water in the U.S. could prevent > 4,000 suicides per year.” That’s significant, but far short of 15,000 to 25,000.And while Ghaemi is very enthusiastic about the potential of groundwater lithium, other researchers are more wary. A comprehensive list of lithium studies, updated just last month, shows that while many studies find positive effects, plenty more found no impact on suicide or other important outcomes. In particular, a large-scale Danish study released in 2017 found “no significant indication of an association between increasing … lithium exposure level and decreasing suicide rate.” -Vox
That said, Vox's Dylan Matthews writes: "At the very least, I’d love for some governments to conduct real, bona fide experiments on lithium. Maybe a state could randomly add lithium to some of its reservoirs but not others, or, conversely, a high-lithium state could try removing it from the water. There are serious ethical questions about doing experiments like this that affect whole populations, but if lithium’s effect is real and we don’t pursue it because we lack compelling enough evidence, thereby endangering thousands of people — that’s an ethical problem too."
In other words, we should go ahead and just try dosing a few populations to see what happens!
Thank You Mr Durden and Zerohedge.
Burt Gummer said it best to 2 Govt spooks who wanted to save the monster and "Research" it into a bio weapon in Tremors 6, Cold Day In Hell.
"Malevolent Ineptoids."
Trump Considering Completely Shutting Down The Border — No Asylum
Henry Rodgers | Capitol Hill Reporter 10/26/2018
President Donald Trump is reportedly considering shutting down the U.S. border from illegal immigrants trying to flee to the U.S. from Central America.
The Trump administration is drafting an executive order that would pause entry for immigrants traveling from countries in Central America due to national security risks. The administration is also considering sending around 1,000 troops to the U.S.-Mexico border, The Washington Post reported. This comes as a migrant caravan of nearly 10,000 people from Central America travels through Mexico, headed toward the U.S. for asylum.
“The administration is considering a wide range of administrative, legal and legislative options to address the Democrat-created crisis of mass illegal immigration. No decisions have been made at this time. Nor will we forecast to smugglers or caravans what precise strategies will be employed,” a White House official told NBC News.
News broke Thursday that Secretary of Defense James Mattis is expected to deploy hundreds of U.S. troops to the southern border to assist Border Patrol. Trump has repeatedly mentioned he will send U.S. troops to the southern border to stop the caravan, calling it a national emergency on Twitter Thursday. (RELATED: We Asked 20 Dems In Key Races What They Would Do With The Migrant Caravan. Not A Single One Had An Answer)
While the exact plans have not been finalized, sources tell NBC News that Trump will have the executive order ready by next week.
Thank You Mr Rodgers and the DC.
Related Interest:
The people comprising this current invasion caravan from Central America do not meet the requirements to qualify as refugees anyway.
https://www.americanimmigrationcouncil.org/research/overview-us-refugee-law-and-policy
The Definition of a “Refugee”
Under U.S. law, a “refugee” is a person who is unable or unwilling to return to his or her home country because of a “well-founded fear of persecution” due to race, membership in a particular social group, political opinion, religion, or national origin. This definition is based on the United Nations 1951 Convention and 1967 Protocols relating to the Status of Refugees, which the United States became a party to in 1968. Following the Vietnam War and the U.S. experience resettling Indochinese refugees, Congress passed the Refugee Act of 1980, which incorporated the Convention’s definition into U.S. law and provides the legal basis for today’s U.S. Refugee Admissions Program (USRAP).OPINION: TB Is A Growing Threat In The US
Where's it coming from? Eh?
There is nothing xenophobic or racist in closing the US borders to prevent TB and other communicable, deadly diseases from re establishing themselves in public places including Kindergartens. Nothing.
dailycaller
Ratna Devi | Founder, Indian Alliance of Patient Groups
Tuberculosis tragically claimed another life in the United States this month when a man in Texas was found dead in an alley “with blood coming from his mouth.” This gruesome scene reminds us that TB is a real threat to us all.
The world’s deadliest contagious disease claimed 1.7 million lives in 2016. Nearly a quarter million of them were children with little hope of a diagnosis, let alone treatment.
Fortunately, the fight against TB is nearing a turning point. A concerted public health effort over the past two decades has saved 53 million lives. But new threats make for an uphill battle: drug-resistant strains, HIV co-infection and a growing prevalence of diabetes and smoking, which raise the chances of developing active TB.
Without urgent new measures, TB will kill 28 million people from 2015–2030. It could also inflict around $1 trillion in economic losses, according to a recent forecast.
New data from the World Health Organization paints a grim picture: last year 10 million people developed TB disease worldwide, with about 27 percent of them in India, my home country.
Prevention coverage for children in many places is abysmal. Only 11 percent of eligible kids under five receive preventive therapy in India, compared with nearly 80 percent in South Africa.
The UN convened a watershed high-level political meeting in September and member states signed a declaration to commit to addressing this global scourge. If these steps bring new attention and funding to the disease — and avoid being co-opted by ideologues — it could mark the beginning of the end of TB.
Over the summer, diplomats in New York negotiated a declaration to call on countries to give top priority to research for a new vaccine, drugs and diagnostic techniques, along with support for community-based public health programs. Such programs would include more proactive outreach efforts in the low-income populations where most TB cases occur.
This declaration would also emphasize the importance of maintaining incentives for innovation in TB drugs, including strong protections for intellectual property (IP) rights in line with international norms.
This tragic loss of life and continued suffering needs to end with concerted efforts from all of us. The National Strategic plan 2017–2025 proposes bold strategies with commensurate resources to rapidly decline TB in India by 2030 in line with the global End TB targets and Sustainable Development Goals to attain the vision of a TB-free India.
The document, however, is silent on promoting investments for new drugs or making available the newer versions for the people in India.
In Europe, the average cost of treatment for drug-susceptible TB is around $11,874, but drugs account for just $488 or 4.1 percent of the total, with the rest due to other factors including hospitalization, monitoring and administrative costs.
In India, the average cost of treating drug-susceptible TB is around $251, with drugs representing as little as $15 of this total, while recent studies found that drugs account for less than a third of Indian MDR TB treatment costs.
In South Africa, the average cost of treating multidrug-resistant (MDR) TB is $17,164 — with drugs contributing less than 5 percent.
Across low-income countries, drug-susceptible TB costs an average $258 and MDR TB an average $1,218 per patient to treat, with drugs contributing only a fraction in both cases ($49 or 19 percent in drug-susceptible cases in low-income countries).
As these examples illustrate, most of the costs associated with TB treatment are generated in other categories including hospitalization, transportation, administration and soon. Although some of this expense is unavoidable, recent studies have shown that decentralized, community-based interventions can yield significant cost savings by minimizing inpatient visits and increasing adherence to drug regimens.
In South Africa, a fully decentralized strategy using local clinics reduced the average cost of treating MDR TB to $6,749. That is 78-percent less than standard treatment in a centralized hospital context. Meanwhile, in India, a community-based model for MDR TB lowered the cost per patient 80 percent. We need new and better treatments to stop TB.
Private investment in TB research declined from $145 million in 2011 to $78.5 million in 2016, leaving U.S. government agencies responsible for the lion’s share (44 percent) of global TB drug research with $316.5 million of R&D spending that year.
While America possesses formidable research capacity, achieving the long-term goal of controlling and perhaps someday eradicating TB will require incentivizing new private sector R&D, as well as expanded funding for public-private collaboration.
Threatening to tear up patent protections through compulsory licensing can only serve to speed the current decline in private sector R&D. We need more incentives for drug companies to make the risky investments needed to find the next generation of breakthrough treatments.
Preventing tens of millions of needless deaths over the next decade will require a global public health effort even more unprecedented than the just concluded high-level political meeting.
Leaders who called for a broad-based public-private cooperation to develop powerful new drugs and a more effective vaccine, as well as a robust community-based strategy to deliver cost-effective diagnosis and treatment to the low-income populations where TB is most prevalent should now engage the stakeholders to develop country plans and measurement mechanisms.
Dr. Ratna Devi is the founder of Indian Alliance of Patient Groups.
Thank You Ratna Devi and the DC.
There is nothing xenophobic or racist in closing the US borders to prevent TB and other communicable, deadly diseases from re establishing themselves in public places including Kindergartens. Nothing.
dailycaller
Ratna Devi | Founder, Indian Alliance of Patient Groups
Tuberculosis tragically claimed another life in the United States this month when a man in Texas was found dead in an alley “with blood coming from his mouth.” This gruesome scene reminds us that TB is a real threat to us all.
The world’s deadliest contagious disease claimed 1.7 million lives in 2016. Nearly a quarter million of them were children with little hope of a diagnosis, let alone treatment.
Fortunately, the fight against TB is nearing a turning point. A concerted public health effort over the past two decades has saved 53 million lives. But new threats make for an uphill battle: drug-resistant strains, HIV co-infection and a growing prevalence of diabetes and smoking, which raise the chances of developing active TB.
Without urgent new measures, TB will kill 28 million people from 2015–2030. It could also inflict around $1 trillion in economic losses, according to a recent forecast.
New data from the World Health Organization paints a grim picture: last year 10 million people developed TB disease worldwide, with about 27 percent of them in India, my home country.
Prevention coverage for children in many places is abysmal. Only 11 percent of eligible kids under five receive preventive therapy in India, compared with nearly 80 percent in South Africa.
The UN convened a watershed high-level political meeting in September and member states signed a declaration to commit to addressing this global scourge. If these steps bring new attention and funding to the disease — and avoid being co-opted by ideologues — it could mark the beginning of the end of TB.
Over the summer, diplomats in New York negotiated a declaration to call on countries to give top priority to research for a new vaccine, drugs and diagnostic techniques, along with support for community-based public health programs. Such programs would include more proactive outreach efforts in the low-income populations where most TB cases occur.
This declaration would also emphasize the importance of maintaining incentives for innovation in TB drugs, including strong protections for intellectual property (IP) rights in line with international norms.
This tragic loss of life and continued suffering needs to end with concerted efforts from all of us. The National Strategic plan 2017–2025 proposes bold strategies with commensurate resources to rapidly decline TB in India by 2030 in line with the global End TB targets and Sustainable Development Goals to attain the vision of a TB-free India.
The document, however, is silent on promoting investments for new drugs or making available the newer versions for the people in India.
In Europe, the average cost of treatment for drug-susceptible TB is around $11,874, but drugs account for just $488 or 4.1 percent of the total, with the rest due to other factors including hospitalization, monitoring and administrative costs.
In India, the average cost of treating drug-susceptible TB is around $251, with drugs representing as little as $15 of this total, while recent studies found that drugs account for less than a third of Indian MDR TB treatment costs.
In South Africa, the average cost of treating multidrug-resistant (MDR) TB is $17,164 — with drugs contributing less than 5 percent.
Across low-income countries, drug-susceptible TB costs an average $258 and MDR TB an average $1,218 per patient to treat, with drugs contributing only a fraction in both cases ($49 or 19 percent in drug-susceptible cases in low-income countries).
As these examples illustrate, most of the costs associated with TB treatment are generated in other categories including hospitalization, transportation, administration and soon. Although some of this expense is unavoidable, recent studies have shown that decentralized, community-based interventions can yield significant cost savings by minimizing inpatient visits and increasing adherence to drug regimens.
In South Africa, a fully decentralized strategy using local clinics reduced the average cost of treating MDR TB to $6,749. That is 78-percent less than standard treatment in a centralized hospital context. Meanwhile, in India, a community-based model for MDR TB lowered the cost per patient 80 percent. We need new and better treatments to stop TB.
Private investment in TB research declined from $145 million in 2011 to $78.5 million in 2016, leaving U.S. government agencies responsible for the lion’s share (44 percent) of global TB drug research with $316.5 million of R&D spending that year.
While America possesses formidable research capacity, achieving the long-term goal of controlling and perhaps someday eradicating TB will require incentivizing new private sector R&D, as well as expanded funding for public-private collaboration.
Threatening to tear up patent protections through compulsory licensing can only serve to speed the current decline in private sector R&D. We need more incentives for drug companies to make the risky investments needed to find the next generation of breakthrough treatments.
Preventing tens of millions of needless deaths over the next decade will require a global public health effort even more unprecedented than the just concluded high-level political meeting.
Leaders who called for a broad-based public-private cooperation to develop powerful new drugs and a more effective vaccine, as well as a robust community-based strategy to deliver cost-effective diagnosis and treatment to the low-income populations where TB is most prevalent should now engage the stakeholders to develop country plans and measurement mechanisms.
Dr. Ratna Devi is the founder of Indian Alliance of Patient Groups.
Thank You Ratna Devi and the DC.
Michael Avenatti Referred For ADDITIONAL Criminal Investigation Regarding Kavanaugh Allegations
dailywire
Ashe Schow
October 26, 2018
Celebrity attorney Michael Avenatti has been referred for possible additional violations regarding his representation of clients who accused Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh of sexual assault.
The additional complaint, from Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley (R-IA), includes information about a second client Avenatti represented, whose name is unknown. This woman backed up Julie Swetnick’s claims that Kavanaugh spiked punch at parties to get women drunk so they could rape them.
On Thursday, Grassley referred Avenatti and his client, Swetnick, to the Justice Department for criminal investigation, alleging they provided false statements, obstructed a congressional investigation, and conspired to violate federal law with their allegations against Kavanaugh. On Friday, Grassley provided additional information supporting the charges against Avenatti, based on a report from NBC that his second client — the unnamed woman — told the news outlet that the celebrity attorney “twisted” her words.
“In light of this new information, I am now referring Mr. Avenatti for investigation of additional potential violations of those same laws, stemming from a second declaration he submitted to the Committee that also appears to contain materially false statements,” Grassley wrote to Attorney General Jeff Sessions and FBI Director Christopher Wray.
Shortly after Grassley sent his first referral, NBC reported that Avenatti’s second client told them on multiple occasions that what was written in her sworn statement was not accurate, and that she never saw Kavanaugh spike the punch and that she didn’t know Swetnick until well after high school. She also said she never saw Kavanaugh act inappropriately toward women.
Avenatti told NBC, according to NBC, that he had recordings of the woman making the claims included in the sworn statement. Shortly after this conversation, the woman texted NBC to affirm what the affidavit said.
NBC called the woman yet again, and she again disputed what was said in the sworn statement.
“Simply put, the sworn statement Mr. Avenatti provided the Committee on October 2 appears to be an outright fraud,” Grassley wrote. “According to NBC News, the purported declarant denied — both before and after the sworn statement was released — the key allegations Mr. Avenatti attributed to her. She stated she was clear and consistent ‘from day one’ with Mr. Avenatti that those claims were not true.”
Grassley added that when Avenatti was questioned about the discrepancies between the sworn statement and what the woman told NBC, “Mr. Avenatti attempted to deceive them in an apparent effort to thwart the truth coming out.”
“Accordingly, in light of the seriousness of these facts, and the threat these types of actions pose to the Committee’s ability to perform its constitutional duties, I hope you will give this referral, as well as my prior one related to Mr. Avenatti, the utmost consideration,” Grassley concluded. “Thank you for your prompt attention to this matter.”
Neither the Justice Department nor the FBI have responded to Grassley’s letter.
In a tweet sent Friday evening after Grassley’s letter became public, Avenatti responded, asking: “How ignorant is Grassley?”
“He keeps publicly demanding an investigation knowing full well that it will likely never happen - it is all for show,” Avenatti wrote. “And if it does, he has placed Kavanaugh at risk of being removed from the SCOTUS.”
“This is what happens when you never attend law school,” he added.
Read More: Brett Kavanaugh Charles Grassley Department of Justice Julie Swetnick Michael Avenatti NBC
Thank You Ms Schow and the dailywire.
see also
Ashe Schow
October 26, 2018
Celebrity attorney Michael Avenatti has been referred for possible additional violations regarding his representation of clients who accused Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh of sexual assault.
The additional complaint, from Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley (R-IA), includes information about a second client Avenatti represented, whose name is unknown. This woman backed up Julie Swetnick’s claims that Kavanaugh spiked punch at parties to get women drunk so they could rape them.
On Thursday, Grassley referred Avenatti and his client, Swetnick, to the Justice Department for criminal investigation, alleging they provided false statements, obstructed a congressional investigation, and conspired to violate federal law with their allegations against Kavanaugh. On Friday, Grassley provided additional information supporting the charges against Avenatti, based on a report from NBC that his second client — the unnamed woman — told the news outlet that the celebrity attorney “twisted” her words.
“In light of this new information, I am now referring Mr. Avenatti for investigation of additional potential violations of those same laws, stemming from a second declaration he submitted to the Committee that also appears to contain materially false statements,” Grassley wrote to Attorney General Jeff Sessions and FBI Director Christopher Wray.
Shortly after Grassley sent his first referral, NBC reported that Avenatti’s second client told them on multiple occasions that what was written in her sworn statement was not accurate, and that she never saw Kavanaugh spike the punch and that she didn’t know Swetnick until well after high school. She also said she never saw Kavanaugh act inappropriately toward women.
Avenatti told NBC, according to NBC, that he had recordings of the woman making the claims included in the sworn statement. Shortly after this conversation, the woman texted NBC to affirm what the affidavit said.
NBC called the woman yet again, and she again disputed what was said in the sworn statement.
“Simply put, the sworn statement Mr. Avenatti provided the Committee on October 2 appears to be an outright fraud,” Grassley wrote. “According to NBC News, the purported declarant denied — both before and after the sworn statement was released — the key allegations Mr. Avenatti attributed to her. She stated she was clear and consistent ‘from day one’ with Mr. Avenatti that those claims were not true.”
Grassley added that when Avenatti was questioned about the discrepancies between the sworn statement and what the woman told NBC, “Mr. Avenatti attempted to deceive them in an apparent effort to thwart the truth coming out.”
“Accordingly, in light of the seriousness of these facts, and the threat these types of actions pose to the Committee’s ability to perform its constitutional duties, I hope you will give this referral, as well as my prior one related to Mr. Avenatti, the utmost consideration,” Grassley concluded. “Thank you for your prompt attention to this matter.”
Neither the Justice Department nor the FBI have responded to Grassley’s letter.
In a tweet sent Friday evening after Grassley’s letter became public, Avenatti responded, asking: “How ignorant is Grassley?”
“He keeps publicly demanding an investigation knowing full well that it will likely never happen - it is all for show,” Avenatti wrote. “And if it does, he has placed Kavanaugh at risk of being removed from the SCOTUS.”
“This is what happens when you never attend law school,” he added.
Read More: Brett Kavanaugh Charles Grassley Department of Justice Julie Swetnick Michael Avenatti NBC
Thank You Ms Schow and the dailywire.
see also
NBC Sat On Information That Undermined Brett Kavanaugh Accusers
Thursday, October 25, 2018
American Psychiatric Association Adds ‘Obsessive Categorization Of Mental Conditions’ To ‘DSM-5’
the onion
WASHINGTON—As part of their ongoing mission to keep their classifications updated with the most recent available findings, the American Psychiatric Association announced Thursday the supplemental addition of “Obsessive Categorization of Mental Conditions” to the fifth edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual Of Mental Disorders. “We’ve seen a significant increase in the number of people reporting an urgent, uncontrollable desire to research, report on, and catalog the symptoms of various mental disorders,” said head researcher Paula Ramos, stressing several times that the most apparent signs of OCMC include the compulsive noting of minute details regarding thousands and thousands of perceived signs of illness followed by extreme organizational tendencies and repeated attempts to achieve publication in prominent medical journals. “Our findings indicate that this condition exists in a spectrum, with some sufferers focusing on general diseases while others are more prone to clustering within a specific subset of the mental health field. We’re confident that continued study will assist doctors in more easily identifying and treating this debilitating disorder, and what we’ve painstakingly catalogued as its 117 common variants and 286 sub-variants, so that its sufferers can go on to live productive, untroubled lives.” Ramos also suggested that OCMC itself could be merely part of a much larger, though mostly benign, mental disorder involving obsessive attempts at educating oneself in order to help others.
Thank You the Onion.
WASHINGTON—As part of their ongoing mission to keep their classifications updated with the most recent available findings, the American Psychiatric Association announced Thursday the supplemental addition of “Obsessive Categorization of Mental Conditions” to the fifth edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual Of Mental Disorders. “We’ve seen a significant increase in the number of people reporting an urgent, uncontrollable desire to research, report on, and catalog the symptoms of various mental disorders,” said head researcher Paula Ramos, stressing several times that the most apparent signs of OCMC include the compulsive noting of minute details regarding thousands and thousands of perceived signs of illness followed by extreme organizational tendencies and repeated attempts to achieve publication in prominent medical journals. “Our findings indicate that this condition exists in a spectrum, with some sufferers focusing on general diseases while others are more prone to clustering within a specific subset of the mental health field. We’re confident that continued study will assist doctors in more easily identifying and treating this debilitating disorder, and what we’ve painstakingly catalogued as its 117 common variants and 286 sub-variants, so that its sufferers can go on to live productive, untroubled lives.” Ramos also suggested that OCMC itself could be merely part of a much larger, though mostly benign, mental disorder involving obsessive attempts at educating oneself in order to help others.
Thank You the Onion.
Wednesday, October 24, 2018
US Must Protect Itself Against China Cyber War
zerohedge
Tyler Durden 10/24/2018
Authored by Richard Fisher via The Epoch Times,
The storm of controversy has yet to subside following the Oct. 4 Bloomberg Businessweek blockbuster story that San Jose, California-based Super Micro Computer Inc.’s made-in-China computer motherboards were secretly “hacked” by the People’s Liberation Army over a two-year period. Another episode in the China cyberwar saga.
This particular hack potentially enabled back-door access to the computers of companies such as Apple and Amazon and U.S. government agencies including the Department of Defense, CIA, NSA, and the Navy.
Immediate security implications for the United States and many other countries are enormous, so it’s not surprising that, weeks later, denials of the report far exceed affirmations.
The day the story was released, Super Micro, Amazon, and Apple denied being affected, and on Oct. 18 Apple CEO Tim Cook asked Bloomberg to retract its story.
Officials from the NSA, FBI and Department of Homeland Security have expressed doubts.
During a U.S. Senate hearing Oct. 9, Kirstjen Nielsen, DHS director, said while DHS did not have evidence to support Bloomberg’s contention of computer supply chain interference, she also said, “It is a very real and emerging threat that we are very concerned about.”
Also on Oct. 9, Bloomberg reported that “a major U.S. telecommunications company” had removed Super Micro computer hardware deemed “manipulated” by China, citing Yossi Appleboum, cybersecurity expert and former Israeli Army intelligence officer.
He also told Bloomberg that he has seen similar Chinese manipulations of computer hardware made by various Chinese vendors, noting there are “countless” points in the Chinese supply chain where manipulations can be introduced.
China Wants to Control Global Cyberspace
This controversy will continue, but we can pause to consider its first major message: China is engaged in a war to control global cyberspace.
This is a vital part of its driving ambition to eclipse the United States as the principle global military power and to impose military control over the Earth-Moon system. Furthermore, until the United States can revive Cold War-era-like cooperation among the democratic allies which protects their military dual-use technology and fights back against China’s cyber war, China increasingly will pervert and weaponize the life-enhancing potential offered by digital technologies in its effort to contain and eventually dominate us.
A stark lesson in the pitfalls of cyber-hubris was offered by former President Bill Clinton, who in an October 2000 speech argued for China to be allowed to join the World Trade Organization. He stated the internet would “change China,” suggesting it would weaken Chinese Communist Party (CCP) control.
Today, CCP totalitarianism is enhanced by its control over its internet Great Wall, which isolates Chinese from the global web; allows increasingly intimate control over them via “smart cities” that record their physical movement; and enables future “social credit scores” that will grade their online support for the CCP in order to determine access to better cities, education, and jobs.
Could China someday assign similar social credit scores to everybody who works or plays online?
The China-Super Micro Connection
To do so, China would require the kind of global backdoor access to computer systems said to have been provided by the Chinese contractors making the hardware for Super Micro.
This past January, it was reported that for five years the new African Union headquarters built by China also has been hacked to send confidential information back to China.
Governments increasingly ban or discourage relying on Chinese telecommunication equipment vendors like Huawei or ZTE, while since October 2016 the Pentagon has warned against using Chinese-made Lenovo computers.
Add to this China’s pervasive 24-7 mining of global computer networks, and its specific attacks against companies and databases to amass military, economic, political, and personal data.
This becomes deadly serious considering that in late 2015 the People’s Liberation Army created a new military service, the Strategic Support Force, to ensure China wins in new battlefields dominated by cyber warfare, databases, electronic warfare, energy weapons, and space warfare.
If China can stealthily “manipulate” their computer hardware, it might also be able to turn against us our future unmanned weapons, made deadlier with advances in artificial intelligence.
Thinking of waging a war against an interest of China’s? It may not be unreasonable to expect your officers, soldiers, and their families to receive dissuasive robocalls from China as the opening move in a much more destructive cyber assault. Imagine how China might seek to manipulate your future “brain chip,” especially if it was made in China.
Consequently, as the Trump administration has sought to illustrate in an Oct. 5 report on the U.S. manufacturing and defense industrial base, the United States must invest in reviving domestic American sources for military-critical industries, including those feeding our electronic infrastructure.
Washington also must go on the offensive. It should seek to revive proven institutions like the former Coordinating Committee for Multilateral Export Controls to better control China’s access to Western military technology.
There is also a need for a multilateral cyber and information campaign that exploits China’s cyber weaknesses. For example, obtaining the ability to manipulate the internet social credit scores of 300 million Chinese could turn up the political heat on the 90 million members of the CCP.
Thank You Mr Durden and Mr Fisher.
Tyler Durden 10/24/2018
Authored by Richard Fisher via The Epoch Times,
The storm of controversy has yet to subside following the Oct. 4 Bloomberg Businessweek blockbuster story that San Jose, California-based Super Micro Computer Inc.’s made-in-China computer motherboards were secretly “hacked” by the People’s Liberation Army over a two-year period. Another episode in the China cyberwar saga.
This particular hack potentially enabled back-door access to the computers of companies such as Apple and Amazon and U.S. government agencies including the Department of Defense, CIA, NSA, and the Navy.
Immediate security implications for the United States and many other countries are enormous, so it’s not surprising that, weeks later, denials of the report far exceed affirmations.
The day the story was released, Super Micro, Amazon, and Apple denied being affected, and on Oct. 18 Apple CEO Tim Cook asked Bloomberg to retract its story.
Officials from the NSA, FBI and Department of Homeland Security have expressed doubts.
During a U.S. Senate hearing Oct. 9, Kirstjen Nielsen, DHS director, said while DHS did not have evidence to support Bloomberg’s contention of computer supply chain interference, she also said, “It is a very real and emerging threat that we are very concerned about.”
Also on Oct. 9, Bloomberg reported that “a major U.S. telecommunications company” had removed Super Micro computer hardware deemed “manipulated” by China, citing Yossi Appleboum, cybersecurity expert and former Israeli Army intelligence officer.
He also told Bloomberg that he has seen similar Chinese manipulations of computer hardware made by various Chinese vendors, noting there are “countless” points in the Chinese supply chain where manipulations can be introduced.
China Wants to Control Global Cyberspace
This controversy will continue, but we can pause to consider its first major message: China is engaged in a war to control global cyberspace.
This is a vital part of its driving ambition to eclipse the United States as the principle global military power and to impose military control over the Earth-Moon system. Furthermore, until the United States can revive Cold War-era-like cooperation among the democratic allies which protects their military dual-use technology and fights back against China’s cyber war, China increasingly will pervert and weaponize the life-enhancing potential offered by digital technologies in its effort to contain and eventually dominate us.
A stark lesson in the pitfalls of cyber-hubris was offered by former President Bill Clinton, who in an October 2000 speech argued for China to be allowed to join the World Trade Organization. He stated the internet would “change China,” suggesting it would weaken Chinese Communist Party (CCP) control.
Today, CCP totalitarianism is enhanced by its control over its internet Great Wall, which isolates Chinese from the global web; allows increasingly intimate control over them via “smart cities” that record their physical movement; and enables future “social credit scores” that will grade their online support for the CCP in order to determine access to better cities, education, and jobs.
Could China someday assign similar social credit scores to everybody who works or plays online?
The China-Super Micro Connection
To do so, China would require the kind of global backdoor access to computer systems said to have been provided by the Chinese contractors making the hardware for Super Micro.
This past January, it was reported that for five years the new African Union headquarters built by China also has been hacked to send confidential information back to China.
Governments increasingly ban or discourage relying on Chinese telecommunication equipment vendors like Huawei or ZTE, while since October 2016 the Pentagon has warned against using Chinese-made Lenovo computers.
Add to this China’s pervasive 24-7 mining of global computer networks, and its specific attacks against companies and databases to amass military, economic, political, and personal data.
This becomes deadly serious considering that in late 2015 the People’s Liberation Army created a new military service, the Strategic Support Force, to ensure China wins in new battlefields dominated by cyber warfare, databases, electronic warfare, energy weapons, and space warfare.
If China can stealthily “manipulate” their computer hardware, it might also be able to turn against us our future unmanned weapons, made deadlier with advances in artificial intelligence.
Thinking of waging a war against an interest of China’s? It may not be unreasonable to expect your officers, soldiers, and their families to receive dissuasive robocalls from China as the opening move in a much more destructive cyber assault. Imagine how China might seek to manipulate your future “brain chip,” especially if it was made in China.
Consequently, as the Trump administration has sought to illustrate in an Oct. 5 report on the U.S. manufacturing and defense industrial base, the United States must invest in reviving domestic American sources for military-critical industries, including those feeding our electronic infrastructure.
Washington also must go on the offensive. It should seek to revive proven institutions like the former Coordinating Committee for Multilateral Export Controls to better control China’s access to Western military technology.
There is also a need for a multilateral cyber and information campaign that exploits China’s cyber weaknesses. For example, obtaining the ability to manipulate the internet social credit scores of 300 million Chinese could turn up the political heat on the 90 million members of the CCP.
Thank You Mr Durden and Mr Fisher.
Tuesday, October 23, 2018
How Our Government Helps Drug-Dealing Doctors Kill Us
madinamerica
Lawrence Kelmenson, MD October 21, 2018
Psychiatry and Pain Management’s soaring profits since 1990 were fed by a unique combination of favorable circumstances never before seen: First, they’re paid mostly by federal funds. These include Medicaid, Medicare, and tax subsidies for employer-paid healthcare. But unlike other federally subsidized industries, health industry goods and services are covered by insurance, so high costs don’t deter client use of them. Just imagine all the fine food and posh restaurants we would access if we had hunger insurance that paid for them.
Mental health and pain treaters have advantages over other industries that rely on insurance payments: Medicare and Medicaid, being federally funded, are able to spend endless public money with few restrictions on coverage, regardless of cost. For example, Medicare costs jumped after a 2008 law raised mental health reimbursement from 50% to 80%.1 Private health insurers tried to rein in rising mental health costs, but were blocked by 1996,2 2008, and 20103 parity laws that forbade mental healthcare limits, copays, deductibles, or certification requirements from being greater than for physical care. This is part of why private insurance is now so costly.
To tap into this endless money, the pain and ‘mental illness’ fields made use of another advantage: Unlike events covered by other types of insurance, an illness is an arbitrary concept. Doctors can thus broaden its definition in order to broaden their domain: It can be a subjective physical perception with no clear or treatable source. For example, chronic pain became an illness. Illnesses do not even need to be physical: Painful thoughts and feelings, and kids acting like kids, also became illnesses. This was endorsed by a 1992 law4 that granted funds for services for the ‘one quarter who will suffer from mental disorders’, and for biomedically-focused mental illness research to be done at the NIH.
So, unlike other insurers that can verify house fires, car wrecks, or death, health insurers can’t verify mental illness or pain. Unlike other MDs, psychiatrists and pain doctors can invent infinite chronic (and thus lucrative) illnesses. Each client can be labeled with many different ones; there’s no limit. And each illness can justify a doctor’s luring the patient into lifelong addiction to euphoria-giving pills.
These MDs can also pad profits by putting clients on disability: Clients will then return regularly/eternally to prove ongoing disability, to ensure that their SSD checks and food/housing/healthcare assistance continue. Since they won’t work, they’ll have the time (and health insurance) to do so. A 1984 law5 made adult disability approval hinge on subjective functional impairment instead of objective disease evidence; this made mental illness (or chronic pain) easier to get SSD for. In 1991,6 the Social Security administration made child disability also hinge on functionality instead of illness proof. Child SSI cases rose five-fold soon after, mostly for mental illness.7 So illness-creators opened doors to disability benefits as well as insurance cash; that’s convenient, since their addictive ‘meds’ make it hard to work.
Two 1990 laws8 9 specified depression, ADHD, etc.to be valid causes of disability (before then, schizophrenia was the only ‘mental illness’ considered disabling). This further eased access to SSD/SSI funds. These laws also rewarded these illnesses by making life-easing accommodations available to those who ‘have’ them. For example, Billy prefers to play video games rather than do homework. By getting him labeled ADHD, his busy parents and teachers won’t have to struggle to teach him good work habits, since he’ll now be given less schoolwork (he’ll also be drugged into submission, so he won’t need to be raised). And his label may qualify his family for SSI, Medicaid, and other benefits.
400 million addictive prescriptions are filled yearly.10 It’s caused so much addiction and overdosing, including among kids who steal their parents’ pills, that the lifespans of white Americans have dropped steadily (they use 2.5 times as many psych11 and opioid12 ‘meds’ as non-whites). Then a 2000 law13 authorized doctors to treat the addictions they caused with yet more opioids (suboxone, or prison heroin). It’s such blatant drug-dealing that this law had to be enacted to make it legal (it circumvented a 1914 law14 that criminalized the prescribing of opiates to maintain addicts’ addictions). Suboxone is often peddled at drug rehabs, where clients thus score rather than quit drugs. Since the 2008 parity law made insurers cover treatment for addiction the same as for physical illness, these rehabs make a killing.
Mental health treaters capitalized on all these favors to become our most costly healthcare sector15 and a major cause of healthcare becoming our government’s top expense and top tax subsidy. Costs of other government programs also spiked, due to mental health, pain, and addiction treaters baiting and trapping millions into reliance on Social Security and other benefits. Since 2016, Congress has had to divert funds from the SS retirement to the SS disability trust fund,16 since the latter couldn’t keep up with all its mental illness and chronic pain claimants (its main recipients17). Businesses cut full-time workers in order to avoid paying their costly healthcare as is required by law. This drove yet more people to seek federal benefits. Nearly a fourth of Americans are on Medicaid now.
Psych drug and opioid prescribers are bankrupting us and exploding our debt. We spend more on healthcare and its addictive pills than all other nations, yet are still pounded by propaganda about “millions suffering needlessly from untreated mental illness.” Things will only get worse; many more mental health laws are on the way. 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26
Deja Vu
Something similar actually did occur before: The British East India Company, aided by England’s parliament which invested in it, bailed it out, and made laws giving it monopolies, dominated trade in the East in the 1700s. It helped spread British colonialism there. In the 1800s, it profited greatly by growing opium in India and selling it in China. This hurt China’s economy by siphoning its silver and turning industrious Chinese people into idle, unproductive addicts. Its emperor finally halted opium imports after his son (China’s prince) died of an overdose (as did our “Prince”). The BEIC reacted by conquering, with British assistance, all Chinese ports and nearby areas, in order to ensure continued opium selling. This began what China calls its “century of humiliation” in which a great empire was brought to its knees and subjugated by England, France, and Japan.27
Are we at the start of our own lost century, with psych pill and opioid dispensers taking on the BEIC’s role? Like our drug-dealing doctors, it succeeded largely due to close alliance and support from its government every step of the way. The only difference is: Our own healers and leaders are killing us!
Show 27 footnotes
Previous articleMr. Rogers, Trauma-Informed Care, and the Limits of Information
Next articleNew Report Points to Gaps in the Evidence for Pediatric Bipolar Disorder
Lawrence Kelmenson, MD
Lawrence Kelmenson has practiced psychiatry for 32 years, working with children, adults, and families. He graduated medical school from State University of New York, and completed psychiatric residency training at Cornell. He then became staff psychiatrist, and later medical director, of Craig House Hospital in Beacon, New York until 2000, and has since conducted a psychotherapy-based private practice in Cold Spring, New York.
Thank You Dr Kelmenson and MIA.
Huge Breakthrough in Lawsuits Against ECT Manufacturers
madinamerica
Peter Breggin, MD October 23, 2018
A long-awaited major electroconvulsive therapy case that was on the eve of trial just settled to the satisfaction of the injured ECT patients and the DK Law Group, LLP by trial attorney David M. Karen in California. While the settlement amount remains confidential, as an expert in the case I am pleased to report that this resolved litigation is a significant victory. The evidence secured has paved the way for more suits against ECT manufacturers that are on the way!
The lawsuit against the ECT manufacturer had its critical breakthrough when the California judge recently allowed the case to proceed to jury trial after their motion for summary judgment was denied. The judge’s decision has effectively established the methodology for bringing this and other lawsuits against ECT manufacturers for their failure to warn of known or knowable risks of brain damage caused by ECT.
As summarized by plaintiff’s attorney Karen, the Court effectively ruled as follows:
• A reasonable jury could find that the ECT device manufacturer failed to warn plaintiffs’ treating physicians of brain damage resulting from ECT, leading to the oft-reported and acknowledged symptoms of permanent memory loss and cognitive impairment.
• A reasonable jury could find that the ECT device manufacturer was in violation of the relevant federal regulations.
• A reasonable jury could find that Plaintiffs suffered brain damage as a result of ECT.
• A reasonable jury could find that the ECT device manufacturer caused Plaintiffs’ brain damage through failure to warn their treating physicians of brain injury, or alternatively by failing to investigate and report allegations of brain damage and permanent memory loss to the FDA, so that information would be available to the public.
My task as the psychiatric expert was to establish that ECT does in fact cause chronic cognitive and mental impairment, and brain damage. I did so in part with the many scientific articles available for free on my ECT Resource Center at www.123ECT.com. I will follow up this first report on the case with analyses of the implications of the lawsuit and with my scientific analysis that helped the judge understand that a reasonable jury might indeed find that ECT causes brain damage.
An excerpt from the law firm’s announcement, published for the first time below, describes their outstanding array of experts:
An assembled cast of accomplished experts in the industry all stepped up to support the ECT Plaintiffs. Including the single most compelling and critical ECT Psychiatrist in the country, the ex-Director of the FDA; the author of the ECT FDA Citizen Petition; and the preeminent NASA/JPL electrical engineer, Plaintiffs were surrounded by some of the greatest experts anywhere — all testifying on behalf of these Plaintiffs that violations of law occurred and establishing that brain injuries were and are caused by ECT.
This is the first in a series from me on the implications of this monumental lawsuit.
Meanwhile, here is the concluding portion of DK Law Group, LLP commentary on the case, including an application for anyone wishing to be evaluated as the plaintiff in potential future suits:
[Despite the array of experts] throughout the litigation, the defense for the manufacturer continued to shirk its responsibility, refusing to acknowledge the flagrant violations in FDA reporting requirements that were at the root of this litigation. Despite decades of complaints of cognitive impairment and disability following ECT, the evidence amassed demonstrated ZERO adverse event reporting on the FDA’s MAUDE database by the Defendant as of the date suit was filed.
While the manufacturers have sought to ignore it for decades, brain damage is the reason now being demonstrated as the cause for the cognitive impairment and memory loss that results after the administration of electroconvulsive shock therapy. All ECT patients are entitled to a warning of that undeniable fact. If that warning is not supplied and an ECT patient suffers the likely brain damage as a result of ECT, those that have sustained lingering cognitive impairment or disability following ECT are entitled to a remedy from the manufacturers who unlawfully failed to warn. Following the recent favorable rulings, the trial attorneys were able to conclude the matter with a confidential settlement on behalf of these Plaintiffs. The discovery obtained from the FDA and the Defendant themselves has now paved the way for help to continue to be provided to all others that have been injured by ECT so that justice can now be achieved for the world of ECT shock survivors.
If you or a loved one are still suffering from lingering side effects of ECT treatment performed within the last few years, (or were misled/advised that ECT was not the cause of your lingering issues from earlier ECT treatment) our experts have determined that brain damage is the likely cause. While testing is required, if you were not warned of the risk of brain damage or permanent impairment of cognitive ability as a risk that may occur from ECT and would like more information to determine if remedies are available to you, feel free to send the following information to: ect@dk4law.com:
Name, Address, Cell # and Email address
# of ECT sessions
Date of last ECT
State of residence
Location of treatment
Summary of post-ECT complaints and duration
Description of any Post-ECT treatment or testing
While the liability and damage evidence secured was compelling for this California trial, laws in all States vary and require individual assessment. Accordingly, don’t wait as statutes of limitation may apply to limit the time in which remedies may be sought.
“Well, what is the sense of ruining my head and erasing my memory, which is my capital,
and putting me out of business? It was a brilliant cure but we lost the patient.
It’s a bum turn, Hotch, terrible.” —Ernest Hemingway on ECT
To be continued….
Previous articleFlooding the World With Psychiatric Drugs Could Increase Mental Disorders
Thank You Dr Breggin and MIA.
Peter Breggin, MD October 23, 2018
A long-awaited major electroconvulsive therapy case that was on the eve of trial just settled to the satisfaction of the injured ECT patients and the DK Law Group, LLP by trial attorney David M. Karen in California. While the settlement amount remains confidential, as an expert in the case I am pleased to report that this resolved litigation is a significant victory. The evidence secured has paved the way for more suits against ECT manufacturers that are on the way!
The lawsuit against the ECT manufacturer had its critical breakthrough when the California judge recently allowed the case to proceed to jury trial after their motion for summary judgment was denied. The judge’s decision has effectively established the methodology for bringing this and other lawsuits against ECT manufacturers for their failure to warn of known or knowable risks of brain damage caused by ECT.
As summarized by plaintiff’s attorney Karen, the Court effectively ruled as follows:
• A reasonable jury could find that the ECT device manufacturer failed to warn plaintiffs’ treating physicians of brain damage resulting from ECT, leading to the oft-reported and acknowledged symptoms of permanent memory loss and cognitive impairment.
• A reasonable jury could find that the ECT device manufacturer was in violation of the relevant federal regulations.
• A reasonable jury could find that Plaintiffs suffered brain damage as a result of ECT.
• A reasonable jury could find that the ECT device manufacturer caused Plaintiffs’ brain damage through failure to warn their treating physicians of brain injury, or alternatively by failing to investigate and report allegations of brain damage and permanent memory loss to the FDA, so that information would be available to the public.
My task as the psychiatric expert was to establish that ECT does in fact cause chronic cognitive and mental impairment, and brain damage. I did so in part with the many scientific articles available for free on my ECT Resource Center at www.123ECT.com. I will follow up this first report on the case with analyses of the implications of the lawsuit and with my scientific analysis that helped the judge understand that a reasonable jury might indeed find that ECT causes brain damage.
An excerpt from the law firm’s announcement, published for the first time below, describes their outstanding array of experts:
An assembled cast of accomplished experts in the industry all stepped up to support the ECT Plaintiffs. Including the single most compelling and critical ECT Psychiatrist in the country, the ex-Director of the FDA; the author of the ECT FDA Citizen Petition; and the preeminent NASA/JPL electrical engineer, Plaintiffs were surrounded by some of the greatest experts anywhere — all testifying on behalf of these Plaintiffs that violations of law occurred and establishing that brain injuries were and are caused by ECT.
This is the first in a series from me on the implications of this monumental lawsuit.
Meanwhile, here is the concluding portion of DK Law Group, LLP commentary on the case, including an application for anyone wishing to be evaluated as the plaintiff in potential future suits:
[Despite the array of experts] throughout the litigation, the defense for the manufacturer continued to shirk its responsibility, refusing to acknowledge the flagrant violations in FDA reporting requirements that were at the root of this litigation. Despite decades of complaints of cognitive impairment and disability following ECT, the evidence amassed demonstrated ZERO adverse event reporting on the FDA’s MAUDE database by the Defendant as of the date suit was filed.
While the manufacturers have sought to ignore it for decades, brain damage is the reason now being demonstrated as the cause for the cognitive impairment and memory loss that results after the administration of electroconvulsive shock therapy. All ECT patients are entitled to a warning of that undeniable fact. If that warning is not supplied and an ECT patient suffers the likely brain damage as a result of ECT, those that have sustained lingering cognitive impairment or disability following ECT are entitled to a remedy from the manufacturers who unlawfully failed to warn. Following the recent favorable rulings, the trial attorneys were able to conclude the matter with a confidential settlement on behalf of these Plaintiffs. The discovery obtained from the FDA and the Defendant themselves has now paved the way for help to continue to be provided to all others that have been injured by ECT so that justice can now be achieved for the world of ECT shock survivors.
If you or a loved one are still suffering from lingering side effects of ECT treatment performed within the last few years, (or were misled/advised that ECT was not the cause of your lingering issues from earlier ECT treatment) our experts have determined that brain damage is the likely cause. While testing is required, if you were not warned of the risk of brain damage or permanent impairment of cognitive ability as a risk that may occur from ECT and would like more information to determine if remedies are available to you, feel free to send the following information to: ect@dk4law.com:
Name, Address, Cell # and Email address
# of ECT sessions
Date of last ECT
State of residence
Location of treatment
Summary of post-ECT complaints and duration
Description of any Post-ECT treatment or testing
While the liability and damage evidence secured was compelling for this California trial, laws in all States vary and require individual assessment. Accordingly, don’t wait as statutes of limitation may apply to limit the time in which remedies may be sought.
“Well, what is the sense of ruining my head and erasing my memory, which is my capital,
and putting me out of business? It was a brilliant cure but we lost the patient.
It’s a bum turn, Hotch, terrible.” —Ernest Hemingway on ECT
To be continued….
Previous articleFlooding the World With Psychiatric Drugs Could Increase Mental Disorders
Thank You Dr Breggin and MIA.
Monday, October 22, 2018
Friday, October 19, 2018
Government Watchdog Files Bar Complaint Against Christine Blasey Ford's Lawyers
dailywire
James Barrett
October 19, 2018
Conservative political action group Judicial Watch announced Friday that it has filed a complaint to the Board of Professional Responsibility of the District of Columbia Court of Appeals against the lawyers who represented Brett Kavanaugh accuser Christine Blasey Ford.
The government watchdog says that lawyers Debra S. Katz, Lisa J. Banks, and Michael R. Bromwich "violat[ed] the rules of professional responsibility" in their representation of Ford in her testimony against then-Supreme Court Kavanaugh by failing to inform her that the Senate Judiciary Committee had offered to meet her at the place of her choosing and hear her testimony in private rather than having to fly across the country and go through the pain of a public testimony.
The group argues that this violates the District of Columbia Rules of Professional Conduct:
Rule l.4(a) – A lawyer shall keep a client reasonably informed about the status of a matter and promptly comply with reasonable requests for information.
Rule 1.4(b) – A lawyer shall explain a matter to the extent reasonably necessary to permit the client to make informed decisions regarding the representation.
Judicial Watch's complaint comes a little over two weeks after an Oct. 2 letter by the Senate Judiciary Committee suggesting that by failing to inform Ford of the committee's offer, her legal team might have violated the bar association's Model Rules of Professional Conduct, which "require a lawyer to consult with his or her client about the means to be used to accomplish the client’s objectives—including informing the client of settlement offers."
Below is the full text of the complaint filed by Judicial Watch:
To the Office of Disciplinary Counsel:
Judicial Watch hereby files a disciplinary complaint against District of Columbia bar members Debra S. Katz, Lisa J. Banks, and Michael R. Bromwich in connection with their representation of Dr. Christine Blasey Ford before the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee [the”Committee”].[1]
Rule l.4(a) of the District of Columbia Rules of Professional Conduct [“DC Rules”] states: “A lawyer shall keep a client reasonably informed about the status of a matter and promptly comply with reasonable requests for information.” Rule 1 .4(b) provides: “A lawyer shall explain a matter to the extent reasonably necessary to permit the client to make informed decisions regarding the representation.”[2]
In this case, Dr. Ford made well-publicized allegations of sexual misconduct involving Judge Brett Kavanaugh of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, whose nomination to the U.S. Supreme Court was before the Committee. Her identity was first revealed in connection with these allegations on September 16, 2018. The next day, September 17, 2018, Ms. Katz went on several television shows asking that the Committee hold a public hearing so that Dr. Ford could offer her testimony.[3]
Sen. Chuck Grassley, Chairman of the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee, honored that request. In a letter sent on September 19, 2018, he informed Ms. Katz and Ms. Banks that the Committee was scheduling a hearing on Judge Kavanaugh’s nomination for September 24, 2018, in order to “give Dr. Ford an opportunity to tell her story to the Senate and, if she chooses, to the American people.” Letter from Sen. Chuck Grassley, Chairman, S. Judiciary Comm., to Debra S. Katz and Lisa J. Banks (Sep. I 9, 2018) (available at https://goo.gl/ce3SVv). He informed Ms. Katz and Ms. Banks that the hearing could be public or private, and that Dr. Ford could also choose to have a public or private staff interview with Committee staff, either by phone or in-person. Id. “To that end,” Chairman Grassley continued, “Committee staff has attempted to contact you directly by phone and e-mail several times to schedule a call at a time convenient for you and your client. We thus far have not heard back from you with regard to that request.” Id. He reiterated that “my staff would still welcome the opportunity to speak with Dr. Ford at a time and place convenient to her.” Id.
On September 21, 2018, Chairman Grassley wrote another letter to Ms. Katz, where he stated that “[t]he Chairman has offered the ability for Dr. Ford to testify in an open session, a closed session, a public staff interview, and a private staff interview. Press Release, Senate Judiciary Committee, Ford ‘Wasn’t Clear’ Committee Offered California Interview in lieu of Public Washington Hearing (Oct. 2, 2018) (available at https://goo.gl/6dmNJd). The Chairman is even willing to fly female staff investigators to meet Dr. Ford and you in California, or anywhere else, to obtain Dr. Ford’s testimony.” Id. (emphasis added).
When the hearing finally took place on September 27, 2018, however, the following exchange took place between Dr. Ford, under oath, and counsel for the Committee, Rachel Mitchell:
“MITCHELL: May I ask, Dr. Ford, how did you get to Washington?
FORD: In an airplane.
MITCHELL: OK. It’s – I ask that, because it’s been reported by the press that you would not submit to an interview with the committee because of your fear of flying. Is – is that true?
FORD: Well, I was willing – I was hoping that they would come to me, but then I realized that was an unrealistic request.
MITCHELL: It would’ve been a quicker trip for me.
FORD: Yes. So that was certainly what I was hoping, was to avoid having to get on an airplane, but I eventually was able to get up the gumption with the help of some friends, and get on the plane.”
Nomination of the Honorable Brett M Kavanaugh to be an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States (Day 5): Hearings before the Comm. on the Judiciary., 115th Cong. (2018) (emphasis added).
Mitchell’s questioning at the hearing continued:
“MITCHELL: Was it communicated to you by your counsel or someone else, that the committee had asked to interview you and that – that they offered to come out to California to do so?
BROMWICH: We’re going to object, Mr. Chairman, to any call for privileged conversations between counsel and Dr. Ford. It’s a privileged conversation …
(CROSSTALK)
GRASSLEY: Would – could – could we – could you validate the fact that the offer was made without her saying a word?
BROMWICH: (OFF-MIKE)
GRASSLEY: Is it possible for that question to be answered without violating any counsel relationships?
FORD: Can I say something to you – do you mind if I say something to you directly?
GRASSLEY: Yes.
FORD: I just appreciate that you did offer that. I wasn’t clear on what the offer was. If you were going to come out to see me, I would have happily hosted you and had you – had been happy to speak with you out there. I just did not – it wasn’t clear to me that that was the case.“
Id. (emphasis added).
Thus, it is clear, by Dr. Ford’s own testimony, that her attorneys did not communicate the Committee’s multiple offers to take her testimony in California, despite the fact that this was Dr. Ford’s preferred option. In fact, Dr. Ford testified that she “wasn’t clear on what the offer was” and regarded the possibility of investigators taking her testimony in California as “unrealistic”-when in fact it had been specifically offered. Id.
Despite knowing of Dr. Ford’s strong preference to not travel to Washington, D.C., it was inexcusable that Dr. Ford’s attorneys should have neglected to inform her of the fact that the Committee investigators were willing to meet her in California. Dr. Ford was thus deprived of the ability to “participate intelligently in decisions concerning the objectives of the representation and the means by which they are to be pursued.” D.C. Rules of Prof I Conduct r. 1.4(b) cmt. 1.
The misconduct of Ms. Katz, Ms. Banks, and Mr. Bromwich noted above has been widely reported. It appears likely that they knowingly subordinated their client’s interest in avoiding the publicity of a Senate hearing and avoiding travel to Washington, D.C. to the desire of Democratic Senators on the Committee to have such a hearing take place in Washington, D.C. Their failure to inform their client of the offer to have Committee staff investigate Dr. Ford in California was dishonest at worst and careless at best. Either way, it is inexcusable, and raises substantial questions about their character and fitness to practice law. It warrants a full investigation by the Office of Disciplinary Counsel.
“We are concerned that ethics rules were violated by Dr. Ford’s attorneys during the Kavanaugh confirmation and took action to get accountability,” stated Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton. “We already filed a Senate ethics complaint against Sen. Cory Booker over his admitted rule breaking and are considering additional steps to address the misconduct committed by Justice Kavanaugh’s opponents.”
###
1 Debra S. Katz, Lisa J. Banks, and Michael R. Bromwich were admitted to the District of Columbia bar on October 14, 1987, August 6, 2001, and December 19, 1980 respectively.
2 Courts in the District of Columbia have a history of enforcing DC Rule 1.4. See Breen v. Chao, 304 F. Supp. 3d 9,
26 (D.D.C. 2018) (Attorneys have “a professional obligation to explain matters to their clients”); Carranza v. Fraas, 763 F. Supp. 2d 113, 125-126 (D.D.C. 2011) (“Withholding such information precludes a client’s ability to participate in any substantial way in decisions that go to the core of the attorney-client relationship.”); In re Ukwu, 926 A.2d 1106, 1135-39 (D.C. 2007) (DC Rules “are not mere aspirations. They set standards that the legal profession is obliged to meet because lawyers often are entrusted with responsibility for some of the most important matters in their clients’ lives … Explaining legal matters to their clients is an essential part of the work of lawyers.”)
3 Dr. Ford engaged her attorneys in the summer of 2018.
Thank You Judicial Watch, Mr Barrett and the Daily Wire.
James Barrett
October 19, 2018
Conservative political action group Judicial Watch announced Friday that it has filed a complaint to the Board of Professional Responsibility of the District of Columbia Court of Appeals against the lawyers who represented Brett Kavanaugh accuser Christine Blasey Ford.
The government watchdog says that lawyers Debra S. Katz, Lisa J. Banks, and Michael R. Bromwich "violat[ed] the rules of professional responsibility" in their representation of Ford in her testimony against then-Supreme Court Kavanaugh by failing to inform her that the Senate Judiciary Committee had offered to meet her at the place of her choosing and hear her testimony in private rather than having to fly across the country and go through the pain of a public testimony.
The group argues that this violates the District of Columbia Rules of Professional Conduct:
Rule l.4(a) – A lawyer shall keep a client reasonably informed about the status of a matter and promptly comply with reasonable requests for information.
Rule 1.4(b) – A lawyer shall explain a matter to the extent reasonably necessary to permit the client to make informed decisions regarding the representation.
Judicial Watch's complaint comes a little over two weeks after an Oct. 2 letter by the Senate Judiciary Committee suggesting that by failing to inform Ford of the committee's offer, her legal team might have violated the bar association's Model Rules of Professional Conduct, which "require a lawyer to consult with his or her client about the means to be used to accomplish the client’s objectives—including informing the client of settlement offers."
Below is the full text of the complaint filed by Judicial Watch:
To the Office of Disciplinary Counsel:
Judicial Watch hereby files a disciplinary complaint against District of Columbia bar members Debra S. Katz, Lisa J. Banks, and Michael R. Bromwich in connection with their representation of Dr. Christine Blasey Ford before the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee [the”Committee”].[1]
Rule l.4(a) of the District of Columbia Rules of Professional Conduct [“DC Rules”] states: “A lawyer shall keep a client reasonably informed about the status of a matter and promptly comply with reasonable requests for information.” Rule 1 .4(b) provides: “A lawyer shall explain a matter to the extent reasonably necessary to permit the client to make informed decisions regarding the representation.”[2]
In this case, Dr. Ford made well-publicized allegations of sexual misconduct involving Judge Brett Kavanaugh of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, whose nomination to the U.S. Supreme Court was before the Committee. Her identity was first revealed in connection with these allegations on September 16, 2018. The next day, September 17, 2018, Ms. Katz went on several television shows asking that the Committee hold a public hearing so that Dr. Ford could offer her testimony.[3]
Sen. Chuck Grassley, Chairman of the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee, honored that request. In a letter sent on September 19, 2018, he informed Ms. Katz and Ms. Banks that the Committee was scheduling a hearing on Judge Kavanaugh’s nomination for September 24, 2018, in order to “give Dr. Ford an opportunity to tell her story to the Senate and, if she chooses, to the American people.” Letter from Sen. Chuck Grassley, Chairman, S. Judiciary Comm., to Debra S. Katz and Lisa J. Banks (Sep. I 9, 2018) (available at https://goo.gl/ce3SVv). He informed Ms. Katz and Ms. Banks that the hearing could be public or private, and that Dr. Ford could also choose to have a public or private staff interview with Committee staff, either by phone or in-person. Id. “To that end,” Chairman Grassley continued, “Committee staff has attempted to contact you directly by phone and e-mail several times to schedule a call at a time convenient for you and your client. We thus far have not heard back from you with regard to that request.” Id. He reiterated that “my staff would still welcome the opportunity to speak with Dr. Ford at a time and place convenient to her.” Id.
On September 21, 2018, Chairman Grassley wrote another letter to Ms. Katz, where he stated that “[t]he Chairman has offered the ability for Dr. Ford to testify in an open session, a closed session, a public staff interview, and a private staff interview. Press Release, Senate Judiciary Committee, Ford ‘Wasn’t Clear’ Committee Offered California Interview in lieu of Public Washington Hearing (Oct. 2, 2018) (available at https://goo.gl/6dmNJd). The Chairman is even willing to fly female staff investigators to meet Dr. Ford and you in California, or anywhere else, to obtain Dr. Ford’s testimony.” Id. (emphasis added).
When the hearing finally took place on September 27, 2018, however, the following exchange took place between Dr. Ford, under oath, and counsel for the Committee, Rachel Mitchell:
“MITCHELL: May I ask, Dr. Ford, how did you get to Washington?
FORD: In an airplane.
MITCHELL: OK. It’s – I ask that, because it’s been reported by the press that you would not submit to an interview with the committee because of your fear of flying. Is – is that true?
FORD: Well, I was willing – I was hoping that they would come to me, but then I realized that was an unrealistic request.
MITCHELL: It would’ve been a quicker trip for me.
FORD: Yes. So that was certainly what I was hoping, was to avoid having to get on an airplane, but I eventually was able to get up the gumption with the help of some friends, and get on the plane.”
Nomination of the Honorable Brett M Kavanaugh to be an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States (Day 5): Hearings before the Comm. on the Judiciary., 115th Cong. (2018) (emphasis added).
Mitchell’s questioning at the hearing continued:
“MITCHELL: Was it communicated to you by your counsel or someone else, that the committee had asked to interview you and that – that they offered to come out to California to do so?
BROMWICH: We’re going to object, Mr. Chairman, to any call for privileged conversations between counsel and Dr. Ford. It’s a privileged conversation …
(CROSSTALK)
GRASSLEY: Would – could – could we – could you validate the fact that the offer was made without her saying a word?
BROMWICH: (OFF-MIKE)
GRASSLEY: Is it possible for that question to be answered without violating any counsel relationships?
FORD: Can I say something to you – do you mind if I say something to you directly?
GRASSLEY: Yes.
FORD: I just appreciate that you did offer that. I wasn’t clear on what the offer was. If you were going to come out to see me, I would have happily hosted you and had you – had been happy to speak with you out there. I just did not – it wasn’t clear to me that that was the case.“
Id. (emphasis added).
Thus, it is clear, by Dr. Ford’s own testimony, that her attorneys did not communicate the Committee’s multiple offers to take her testimony in California, despite the fact that this was Dr. Ford’s preferred option. In fact, Dr. Ford testified that she “wasn’t clear on what the offer was” and regarded the possibility of investigators taking her testimony in California as “unrealistic”-when in fact it had been specifically offered. Id.
Despite knowing of Dr. Ford’s strong preference to not travel to Washington, D.C., it was inexcusable that Dr. Ford’s attorneys should have neglected to inform her of the fact that the Committee investigators were willing to meet her in California. Dr. Ford was thus deprived of the ability to “participate intelligently in decisions concerning the objectives of the representation and the means by which they are to be pursued.” D.C. Rules of Prof I Conduct r. 1.4(b) cmt. 1.
The misconduct of Ms. Katz, Ms. Banks, and Mr. Bromwich noted above has been widely reported. It appears likely that they knowingly subordinated their client’s interest in avoiding the publicity of a Senate hearing and avoiding travel to Washington, D.C. to the desire of Democratic Senators on the Committee to have such a hearing take place in Washington, D.C. Their failure to inform their client of the offer to have Committee staff investigate Dr. Ford in California was dishonest at worst and careless at best. Either way, it is inexcusable, and raises substantial questions about their character and fitness to practice law. It warrants a full investigation by the Office of Disciplinary Counsel.
“We are concerned that ethics rules were violated by Dr. Ford’s attorneys during the Kavanaugh confirmation and took action to get accountability,” stated Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton. “We already filed a Senate ethics complaint against Sen. Cory Booker over his admitted rule breaking and are considering additional steps to address the misconduct committed by Justice Kavanaugh’s opponents.”
###
1 Debra S. Katz, Lisa J. Banks, and Michael R. Bromwich were admitted to the District of Columbia bar on October 14, 1987, August 6, 2001, and December 19, 1980 respectively.
2 Courts in the District of Columbia have a history of enforcing DC Rule 1.4. See Breen v. Chao, 304 F. Supp. 3d 9,
26 (D.D.C. 2018) (Attorneys have “a professional obligation to explain matters to their clients”); Carranza v. Fraas, 763 F. Supp. 2d 113, 125-126 (D.D.C. 2011) (“Withholding such information precludes a client’s ability to participate in any substantial way in decisions that go to the core of the attorney-client relationship.”); In re Ukwu, 926 A.2d 1106, 1135-39 (D.C. 2007) (DC Rules “are not mere aspirations. They set standards that the legal profession is obliged to meet because lawyers often are entrusted with responsibility for some of the most important matters in their clients’ lives … Explaining legal matters to their clients is an essential part of the work of lawyers.”)
3 Dr. Ford engaged her attorneys in the summer of 2018.
Thank You Judicial Watch, Mr Barrett and the Daily Wire.
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