Podcast appearances and mentions of John Ashcroft

Welcome to Original Jurisdiction, the latest legal publication by me, David Lat. You can learn more about Original Jurisdiction by reading its About page, and you can email me at davidlat@substack.com. This is a reader-supported publication; you can subscribe by clicking here.Yesterday, Southern California Edison (SCE), the utility whose power lines may have started the devastating Eaton Fire, announced its Wildfire Recovery Compensation Program. Under the program, people affected by the fire can receive hundreds of thousands or even millions of dollars in compensation, in a matter of months rather than years—but in exchange, they must give up their right to sue.It should come as no surprise that SCE, in designing the program, sought the help of Kenneth Feinberg. For more than 40 years, often in the wake of tragedy or disaster, Feinberg has helped mediate and resolve seemingly intractable crises. He's most well-known for how he and his colleague Camille Biros designed and administered the September 11th Victim Compensation Fund. But he has worked on many other headline-making matters over the years, including the Agent Orange product liability litigation, the Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill Trust, the multidistrict litigation involving Monsanto's Roundup weed killer—and now, of course, the Eaton Fire.How did Ken develop such a fascinating and unique practice? What is the most difficult aspect of administering these giant compensation funds? Do these funds represent the wave of the future, as an alternative to (increasingly expensive) litigation? Having just turned 80, does he have any plans to retire?Last week, I had the pleasure of interviewing Ken—the day after his 80th birthday—and we covered all these topics. The result is what I found to be one of the most moving conversations I've ever had on this podcast.Thanks to Ken Feinberg for joining me—and, of course, for his many years of service as America's go-to mediator in times of crisis.Show Notes:* Kenneth Feinberg bio, Wikipedia* Kenneth Feinberg profile, Chambers and Partners* L.A. Fire Victims Face a Choice, by Jill Cowan for The New York TimesPrefer reading to listening? For paid subscribers, a transcript of the entire episode appears below.Sponsored by:NexFirm helps Biglaw attorneys become founding partners. To learn more about how NexFirm can help you launch your firm, call 212-292-1000 or email careerdevelopment@nexfirm.com.Three quick notes about this transcript. First, it has been cleaned up from the audio in ways that don't alter substance—e.g., by deleting verbal filler or adding a word here or there to clarify meaning. Second, my interviewee has not reviewed this transcript, and any errors are mine. Third, because of length constraints, this newsletter may be truncated in email; to view the entire post, simply click on “View entire message” in your email app.David Lat: Welcome to the Original Jurisdiction podcast. I'm your host, David Lat, author of a Substack newsletter about law and the legal profession also named Original Jurisdiction, which you can read and subscribe to at davidlat.substack.com. You're listening to the eighty-fourth episode of this podcast, recorded on Friday, October 24.Thanks to this podcast's sponsor, NexFirm. NexFirm helps Biglaw attorneys become founding partners. To learn more about how NexFirm can help you launch your firm, call 212-292-1000 or email careerdevelopment@nexfirm.com. Want to know who the guest will be for the next Original Jurisdiction podcast? Follow NexFirm on LinkedIn for a preview.I like to think that I've produced some good podcast episodes over the past three-plus years, but I feel that this latest one is a standout. I'm hard-pressed to think of an interview that was more emotionally affecting to me than what you're about to hear.Kenneth Feinberg is a leading figure in the world of mediation and alternative dispute resolution. He is most well-known for having served as special master of the U.S. government's September 11th Victim Compensation Fund—and for me, as someone who was in New York City on September 11, I found his discussion of that work profoundly moving. But he has handled many major matters over the years, such as the Agent Orange product liability litigation to the BP Deepwater Horizon Disaster Victim Compensation Fund. And he's working right now on a matter that's in the headlines: the California wildfires. Ken has been hired by Southern California Edison to help design a compensation program for victims of the 2025 Eaton fire. Ken has written about his fascinating work in two books: What Is Life Worth?: The Unprecedented Effort to Compensate the Victims of 9/11 and Who Gets What: Fair Compensation after Tragedy and Financial Upheaval. Without further ado, here's my conversation with Ken Feinberg.Ken, thank you so much for joining me.Ken Feinberg: Thank you very much; it's an honor to be here.DL: We are recording this shortly after your 80th birthday, so happy birthday!KF: Thank you very much.DL: Let's go back to your birth; let's start at the beginning. You grew up in Massachusetts, I believe.KF: That's right: Brockton, Massachusetts, about 20 miles south of Boston.DL: Your parents weren't lawyers. Tell us about what they did.KF: My parents were blue-collar workers from Massachusetts, second-generation immigrants. My father ran a wholesale tire distributorship, my mother was a bookkeeper, and we grew up in the 1940s and ‘50s, even the early ‘60s, in a town where there was great optimism, a very vibrant Jewish community, three different synagogues, a very optimistic time in American history—post-World War II, pre-Vietnam, and a time when communitarianism, working together to advance the collective good, was a prominent characteristic of Brockton, and most of the country, during the time that I was in elementary school and high school in Brockton.DL: Did the time in which you grow up shape or influence your decision to go into law?KF: Yes. More than law—the time growing up had a great impact on my decision to give back to the community from which I came. You've got to remember, when I was a teenager, the president of the United States was John F. Kennedy, and I'll never forget because it had a tremendous impact on me—President Kennedy reminding everybody that public service is a noble undertaking, government is not a dirty word, and especially his famous quote (or one of his many quotes), “Every individual can make a difference.” I never forgot that, and it had a personal impact on me and has had an impact on me throughout my life. [Ed. note: The quotation generally attributed to JFK is, “One person can make a difference, and everyone should try.” Whether he actually said these exact words is unclear, but it's certainly consistent with many other sentiments he expressed throughout his life.]DL: When you went to college at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, what did you study?KF: I studied history and political science. I was very interested in how individuals over the centuries change history, the theory of historians that great individuals articulate history and drive it in a certain direction—for good, like President Kennedy or Abraham Lincoln or George Washington, or for ill, like Adolf Hitler or Mussolini. And so it was history that I really delved into in my undergraduate years.DL: What led you then to turn to law school?KF: I always enjoyed acting on the stage—theater, comedies, musicals, dramas—and at the University of Massachusetts, I did quite a bit of that. In my senior year, I anticipated going to drama school at Yale, or some other academic master's program in theater. My father gave me very good advice. He said, “Ken, most actors end up waiting on restaurant tables in Manhattan, waiting for a big break that never comes. Why don't you turn your skills on the stage to a career in the courtroom, in litigation, talking to juries and convincing judges?” That was very sound advice from my father, and I ended up attending NYU Law School and having a career in the law.DL: Yes—and you recount that story in your book, and I just love that. It's really interesting to hear what parents think of our careers. But anyway, you did very well in law school, you were on the law review, and then your first job out of law school was something that we might expect out of someone who did well in law school.KF: Yes. I was a law clerk to the chief judge of New York State, Stanley Fuld, a very famous state jurist, and he had his chambers in New York City. For one week, every six or seven weeks, we would go to the state capitol in Albany to hear cases, and it was Judge Fuld who was my transition from law school to the practice of law.DL: I view clerking as a form of government service—and then you continued in service after that.KF: That's right. Remembering what my father had suggested, I then turned my attention to the courtroom and became an assistant United States attorney, a federal prosecutor, in New York City. I served as a prosecutor and as a trial lawyer for a little over three years. And then I had a wonderful opportunity to go to work for Senator Ted Kennedy on the Senate Judiciary Committee in Washington and stayed with him for about five years.DL: You talk about this also in your books—you worked on a pretty diverse range of issues for the senator, right?KF: That's right. For the first three years I worked on his staff on the Senate Judiciary Committee, with some excellent colleagues—soon-to-be Supreme Court justice Stephen Breyer was with me, noted litigator David Boies was in the office—and for the first three years, it was law-related issues. Then in 1978, Senator Kennedy asked me to be his chief of staff, and once I went over and became his chief of staff, the issues of course mushroomed. He was running for president, so there were issues of education, health, international relations—a wide diversity of issues, very broad-based.DL: I recall that you didn't love the chief of staff's duties.KF: No. Operations or administration was not my priority. I loved substance, issues—whatever the issues were, trying to work out legislative compromises, trying to give back something in the way of legislation to the people. And internal operations and administration, I quickly discovered, was not my forte. It was not something that excited me.DL: Although it's interesting: what you are most well-known for is overseeing and administering these large funds and compensating victims of these horrific tragedies, and there's a huge amount of administration involved in that.KF: Yes, but I'm a very good delegator. In fact, if you look at the track record of my career in designing and administering these programs—9/11 or the Deepwater Horizon oil spill or the Patriots' Day Marathon bombings in Boston—I was indeed fortunate in all of those matters to have at my side, for over 40 years, Camille Biros. She's not a lawyer, but she's the nation's expert on designing, administering, and operating these programs, and as you delve into what I've done and haven't done, her expertise has been invaluable.DL: I would call Camille your secret weapon, except she's not secret. She's been profiled in The New York Times, and she's a well-known figure in her own right.KF: That is correct. She was just in the last few months named one of the 50 Women Over 50 that have had such an impact in the country—that list by Forbes that comes out every year. She's prominently featured in that magazine.DL: Shifting back to your career, where did you go after your time in the Senate?KF: I opened up a Washington office for a prominent New York law firm, and for the next decade or more, that was the center of my professional activity.DL: So that was Kaye Scholer, now Arnold & Porter Kaye Scholer. What led you to go from your career in the public sector, where you spent a number of your years right out of law school, into so-called Biglaw?KF: Practicality and financial considerations. I had worked for over a decade in public service. I now had a wife, I had three young children, and it was time to give them financial security. And “Biglaw,” as you put it—Biglaw in Washington was lucrative, and it was something that gave me a financial base from which I could try and expand my different interests professionally. And that was the reason that for about 12 years I was in private practice for a major firm, Kaye Scholer.DL: And then tell us what happened next.KF: A great lesson in not planning too far ahead. In 1984, I got a call from a former clerk of Judge Fuld whom I knew from the clerk network: Judge Jack Weinstein, a nationally recognized jurist from Brooklyn, the Eastern District, and a federal judge. He had on his docket the Vietnam veterans' Agent Orange class action.You may recall that there were about 250,000 Vietnam veterans who came home claiming illness or injury or death due to the herbicide Agent Orange, which had been dropped by the U.S. Air Force in Vietnam to burn the foliage and vegetation where the Viet Cong enemy might be hiding. Those Vietnam veterans came home suffering terrible diseases, including cancer and chloracne (a sort of acne on the skin), and they brought a lawsuit. Judge Weinstein had the case. Weinstein realized that if that case went to trial, it could be 10 years before there'd be a result, with appeals and all of that.So he appointed me as mediator, called the “special master,” whose job it was to try and settle the case, all as a mediator. Well, after eight weeks of trying, we were successful. There was a master settlement totaling about $250 million—at the time, one of the largest tort verdicts in history. And that one case, front-page news around the nation, set me on a different track. Instead of remaining a Washington lawyer involved in regulatory and legislative matters, I became a mediator, an individual retained by the courts or by the parties to help resolve a case. And that was the beginning. That one Agent Orange case transformed my entire professional career and moved me in a different direction completely.DL: So you knew the late Judge Weinstein through Fuld alumni circles. What background did you have in mediation already, before you handled this gigantic case?KF: None. I told Judge Weinstein, “Judge, I never took a course in mediation at law school (there wasn't one then), and I don't know anything about bringing the parties together, trying to get them to settle.” He said, “I know you. I know your background. I've followed your career. You worked for Senator Kennedy. You are the perfect person.” And until the day I die, I'm beholden to Judge Weinstein for having faith in me to take this on.DL: And over the years, you actually worked on a number of matters at the request of Judge Weinstein.KF: A dozen. I worked on tobacco cases, on asbestos cases, on drug and medical device cases. I even worked for Judge Weinstein mediating the closing of the Shoreham nuclear plant on Long Island. I handled a wide range of cases where he called on me to act as his court-appointed mediator to resolve cases on his docket.DL: You've carved out a very unique and fascinating niche within the law, and I'm guessing that most people who meet you nowadays know who you are. But say you're in a foreign country or something, and some total stranger is chatting with you and asks what you do for a living. What would you say?KF: I would say I'm a lawyer, and I specialize in dispute resolution. It might be mediation, it might be arbitration, or it might even be negotiation, where somebody asks me to negotiate on their behalf. So I just tell people there is a growing field of law in the United States called ADR—alternative dispute resolution—and that it is, as you say, David, my niche, my focus when called upon.DL: And I think it's fair to say that you're one of the founding people in this field or early pioneers—or I don't know how you would describe it.KF: I think that's right. When I began with Agent Orange, there was no mediation to speak of. It certainly wasn't institutionalized; it wasn't streamlined. Today, in 2025, the American Bar Association has a special section on alternative dispute resolution, it's taught in every law school in the United States, there are thousands of mediators and arbitrators, and it's become a major leg in law school of different disciplines and specialties.DL: One question I often ask my guests is, “What is the matter you are most proud of?” Another question I often ask my guests is, “What is the hardest matter you've ever had to deal with?” Another question I often ask my guests is, “What is the matter that you're most well-known for?” And I feel in your case, the same matter is responsive to all three of those questions.KF: That's correct. The most difficult, the most challenging, the most rewarding matter, the one that's given me the most exposure, was the federal September 11 Victim Compensation Fund of 2001, when I was appointed by President George W. Bush and Attorney General John Ashcroft to implement, design, and administer a very unique federal law that had been enacted right after 9/11.DL: I got chills as you were just even stating that, very factually, because I was in New York on 9/11, and a lot of us remember the trauma and difficulty of that time. And you basically had to live with that and talk to hundreds, even thousands, of people—survivors, family members—for almost three years. And you did it pro bono. So let me ask you this: what were you thinking?KF: What triggered my interest was the law itself. Thirteen days after the attacks, Congress passed this law, unique in American history, setting up a no-fault administrator compensation system. Don't go to court. Those who volunteer—families of the dead, those who were physically injured at the World Trade Center or the Pentagon—you can voluntarily seek compensation from a taxpayer-funded law. Now, if you don't want it, you don't have to go. It's a voluntary program.The key will be whether the special master or the administrator will be able to convince people that it is a better avenue to pursue than a long, delayed, uncertain lawsuit. And based on my previous experience for the last 15 years, starting with Agent Orange and asbestos and these other tragedies, I volunteered. I went to Senator Kennedy and said, “What about this?” He said, “Leave it to me.” He called President Bush. He knew Attorney General John Ashcroft, who was his former colleague in the U.S. Senate, and he had great admiration for Senator Ashcroft. And so I was invited by the attorney general for an interview, and I told him I was interested. I told him I would only do it pro bono. You can't get paid for a job like this; it's patriotism. And he said, “Go for it.” And he turned out to be my biggest, strongest ally during the 33 months of the program.DL: Are you the managing partner of a boutique or midsize firm? If so, you know that your most important job is attracting and retaining top talent. It's not easy, especially if your benefits don't match up well with those of Biglaw firms or if your HR process feels “small time.” NexFirm has created an onboarding and benefits experience that rivals an Am Law 100 firm, so you can compete for the best talent at a price your firm can afford. Want to learn more? Contact NexFirm at 212-292-1002 or email betterbenefits@nexfirm.com.You talk about this in your books: you were recommended by a very prominent Democratic politician, and the administration at the time was Republican. George W. Bush was president, and John Ashcroft was the attorney general. Why wouldn't they have picked a Republican for this project?KF: Very good question. Senator Kennedy told both of them, “You better be careful here. This is a very, very uncertain program, with taxpayer money used to pay only certain victims. This could be a disaster. And you would be well-advised to pick someone who is not a prominent friend of yours, who is not perceived as just a Republican arm of the Justice Department or the White House. And I've got the perfect person. You couldn't pick a more opposite politician than my former chief of staff, Ken Feinberg. But look at what he's done.” And I think to Senator Kennedy's credit, and certainly to President Bush and to John Ashcroft's, they selected me.DL: As you would expect with a program of this size and complexity, there was controversy and certainly criticism over the years. But overall, looking back, I think people regard it widely as a huge success. Do you have a sense or an estimate of what percentage of people in the position to accept settlements through the program did that, rather than litigate? Because in accepting funds from the program, they did waive their right to bring all sorts of lawsuits.KF: That's correct. If you look at the statistics, if the statistics are a barometer of success, 5,300 applicants were eligible, because of death—about 2,950, somewhere in there—and the remaining claims were for physical injury. Of the 5,300, 97 percent voluntarily accepted the compensation. Only 94 people, 3 percent, opted out, and they all settled their cases five years later. There was never a trial on who was responsible in the law for 9/11. So if statistics are an indication—and I think they are a good indication—the program was a stunning success in accomplishing Congress's objective, which was diverting people voluntarily out of the court system.DL: Absolutely. And that's just a striking statistic. It was really successful in getting funds to families that needed it. They had lost breadwinners; they had lost loved ones. It was hugely successful, and it did not take a decade, as some of these cases involving just thousands of victims often do.I was struck by one thing you just said. You mentioned there was really no trial. And in reading your accounts of your work on this, it seemed almost like people viewed talking to you and your colleagues, Camille and others on this—I think they almost viewed that as their opportunity to be heard, since there wasn't a trial where they would get to testify.KF: That's correct. The primary reason for the success of the 9/11 Fund, and a valuable lesson for me thereafter, was this: give victims the opportunity to be heard, not only in public town-hall meetings where collectively people can vent, but in private, with doors closed. It's just the victim and Feinberg or his designee, Camille. We were the face of the government here. You can't get a meeting with the secretary of defense or the attorney general, the head of the Department of Justice. What you can get is an opportunity behind closed doors to express your anger, your frustration, your disappointment, your sense of uncertainty, with the government official responsible for cutting the checks. And that had an enormous difference in assuring the success of the program.DL: What would you say was the hardest aspect of your work on the Fund?KF: The hardest part of the 9/11 Fund, which I'll never recover from, was not calculating the value of a life. Judges and juries do that every day, David, in every court, in New Jersey and 49 other states. That is not a difficult assignment. What would the victim have earned over a work life? Add something for pain and suffering and emotional distress, and there's your check.The hardest part in any of these funds, starting with 9/11—the most difficult aspect, the challenge—is empathy, and your willingness to sit for over 900 separate hearings, me alone with family members or victims, to hear what they want to tell you, and to make that meeting, from their perspective, worthwhile and constructive. That's the hard part.DL: Did you find it sometimes difficult to remain emotionally composed? Or did you, after a while, develop a sort of thick skin?KF: You remain composed. You are a professional. You have a job to do, for the president of the United States. You can't start wailing and crying in the presence of somebody who was also wailing and crying, so you have to compose yourself. But I tell people who say, “Could I do what you did?” I say, “Sure. There are plenty of people in this country that can do what I did—if you can brace yourself for the emotional trauma that comes with meeting with victim after victim after victim and hearing their stories, which are...” You can't make them up. They're so heart-wrenching and so tragic.I'll give you one example. A lady came to see me, 26 years old, sobbing—one of hundreds of people I met with. “Mr. Feinberg, I lost my husband. He was a fireman at the World Trade Center. He died on 9/11. And he left me with our two children, six and four. Now, Mr. Feinberg, you've calculated and told me I'm going to receive $2.4 million, tax-free, from this 9/11 Fund. I want it in 30 days.”I said to Mrs. Jones, “This is public, taxpayer money. We have to go down to the U.S. Treasury. They've got to cut the checks; they've got to dot all the i's and cross all the t's. It may be 60 days or 90 days, but you'll get your money.”“No. Thirty days.”I said, “Mrs. Jones, why do you need the money in 30 days?”She said, “Why? I'll tell you why, Mr. Feinberg. I have terminal cancer. I have 10 weeks to live. My husband was going to survive me and take care of our two children. Now they're going to be orphans. I have got to get this money, find a guardian, make sure the money's safe, prepare for the kids' schooling. I don't have a lot of time. I need your help.”Well, we ran down to the U.S. Treasury and helped process the check in record time. We got her the money in 30 days—and eight weeks later, she died. Now when you hear story after story like this, you get some indication of the emotional pressure that builds and is debilitating, frankly. And we managed to get through it.DL: Wow. I got a little choked up just even hearing you tell that. Wow—I really don't know what to say.When you were working on the 9/11 Fund, did you have time for any other matters, or was this pretty much exclusively what you were working on for the 33 months?KF: Professionally, it was exclusive. Now what I did was, I stayed in my law firm, so I had a living. Other people in the firm were generating income for the firm; I wasn't on the dole. But it was exclusive. During the day, you are swamped with these individual requests, decisions that have to be made, checks that have to be cut. At night, I escaped: opera, orchestral concerts, chamber music, art museums—the height of civilization. During the day, in the depths of horror of civilization; at night, an escape, an opportunity to just enjoy the benefits of civilization. You better have a loving family, as I did, that stands behind you—because you never get over it, really.DL: That's such an important lesson, to actually have that time—because if you wanted to, you could have worked on this 24/7. But it is important to have some time to just clear your head or spend time with your family, especially just given what you were dealing with day-to-day.KF: That's right. And of course, during the day, we made a point of that as well. If we were holding hearings like the one I just explained, we'd take a one-hour break, go for a walk, go into Central Park or into downtown Washington, buy an ice cream cone, see the kids playing in playgrounds and laughing. You've got to let the steam out of the pressure cooker, or it'll kill you. And that was the most difficult part of the whole program. In all of these programs, that's the common denominator: emotional stress and unhappiness on the part of the victims.DL: One last question, before we turn to some other matters. There was also a very large logistical apparatus associated with this, right? For example, PricewaterhouseCoopers. It wasn't just you and Camille trying to deal with these thousands of survivors and claimants; you did have support.KF: That's right. Pricewaterhouse won the bid at the Justice Department. This is public: Pricewaterhouse, for something like around $100 million, put 450 people to work with us to help us process claims, appraise values, do the research. Pricewaterhouse was a tremendous ally and has gone on, since 9/11, to handle claims design and claims administration, as one of its many specialties. Emily Kent, Chuck Hacker, people like that we worked with for years, very much experts in these areas.DL: So after your work on the 9/11 Fund, you've worked on a number of these types of matters. Is there one that you would say ranks second in terms of complexity or difficulty or meaningfulness to you?KF: Yes. Deepwater Horizon in 2011, 2012—that oil rig in the Gulf of Mexico blew up and killed about, I don't know, 15 to 20 people in the explosion. But the real challenge in that program was how we received, in 16 months, about 1,250,000 claims for business interruption, business losses, property damage. We received over a million claims from 50 states. I think we got probably a dozen claims from New Jersey; I didn't know the oil had gotten to New Jersey. We received claims from 35 foreign countries. And the sheer volume of the disaster overwhelmed us. We had, at one point, something like 40,000 people—vendors—working for us. We had 35 offices throughout the Gulf of Mexico, from Galveston, Texas, all the way to Mobile Bay, Alabama. Nevertheless, in 16 months, on behalf of BP, Deepwater Horizon, we paid out all BP money, a little over $7 billion, to 550,000 eligible claimants. And that, I would say, other than 9/11, had the greatest impact and was the most satisfying.DL: You mentioned some claims coming from some pretty far-flung jurisdictions. In these programs, how much of a problem is fraud?KF: Not much. First of all, with death claims like 9/11 or the Boston Marathon bombings or the 20 first-graders who died in Sandy Hook, Connecticut, at the hands of a deranged gunmen—most of the time, in traumatic death and injury, you've got records. No one can beat the system; you have to have a death certificate. In 9/11, where are your military records, if you were at the Pentagon? Where are the airplane manifests? You've got to be on the manifest if you were flying on that plane.Now, the problem becomes more pronounced in something like BP, where you've got over a million claims, and you wonder, how many people can claim injury from this explosion? There we had an anti-fraud unit—Guidepost, Bart Schwartz's company—and they did a tremendous job of spot-checking claims. I think that out of over a million claims, there may have been 25,000 that were suspicious. And we sent those claims to the Justice Department, and they prosecuted a fair number of people. But it wasn't a huge problem. I think the fraud rate was something like 3 percent; that's nothing. So overall, we haven't found—and we have to be ever-vigilant, you're right—but we haven't found much in the way of fraud.DL: I'm glad to hear that, because it would really be very depressing to think that there were people trying to profiteer off these terrible disasters and tragedies. Speaking of continuing disasters and tragedies, turning to current events, you are now working with Southern California Edison in dealing with claims related to the Eaton Fire. And this is a pending matter, so of course you may have some limits in terms of what you can discuss, but what can you say in a general sense about this undertaking?KF: This is the Los Angeles wildfires that everybody knows about, from the last nine or ten months—the tremendous fire damage in Los Angeles. One of the fires, or one of the selected hubs of the fire, was the Eaton Fire. Southern California Edison, the utility involved in the litigation and finger-pointing, decided to set up, à la 9/11, a voluntary claims program. Not so much to deal with death—there were about 19 deaths, and a handful of physical injuries—but terrible fire damage, destroyed homes, damaged businesses, smoke and ash and soot, for miles in every direction. And the utility decided, its executive decided, “We want to do the right thing here. We may be held liable or we may not be held liable for the fire, but we think the right thing to do is nip in the bud this idea of extended litigation. Look at 9/11: only 94 people ended up suing. We want to set up a program.”They came to Camille and me. Over the last eight weeks, we've designed the program, and I think in the last week of October or the first week of November, you will see publicly, “Here is the protocol; here is the claim form. Please submit your claims, and we'll get them paid within 90 days.” And if history is an indicator, Camille and I think that the Eaton Fire Protocol will be a success, and the great bulk of the thousands of victims will voluntarily decide to come into the program. We'll see. [Ed. note: On Wednesday, a few days after Ken and I recorded this episode, Southern California Edison announced its Wildfire Recovery Compensation Program.]DL: That raises a question that I'm curious about. How would you describe the relationship between the work that you and Camille and your colleagues do and the traditional work of the courts, in terms of in-the-trenches litigation? Because I do wonder whether the growth in your field is perhaps related to some developments in litigation, in terms of litigation becoming more expensive over the decades (in a way that far outstrips inflation), more complicated, or more protracted. How would you characterize that relationship?KF: I would say that the programs that we design and administer—like 9/11, like BP, plus the Eaton wildfires—are an exception to the rule. Nobody should think that these programs that we have worked on are the wave of the future. They are not the wave of the future; they are isolated, unique examples, where a company—or in 9/11, the U.S. government—decides, “We ought to set up a special program where the courts aren't involved, certainly not directly.” In 9/11, they were prohibited to be involved, by statute; in some of these other programs, like BP, the courts have a relationship, but they don't interfere with the day-to-day administration of the program.And I think the American people have a lot of faith in the litigation system that you correctly point out can be uncertain, very inefficient, and very costly. But the American people, since the founding of the country, think, “You pick your lawyer, I'll pick my lawyer, and we'll have a judge and jury decide.” That's the American rule of law; I don't think it's going to change. But occasionally there is a groundswell of public pressure to come up with a program, or there'll be a company—like the utility, like BP—that decides to have a program.And I'll give you one other example: the Catholic Church confronted thousands of claims of sexual abuse by priests. It came to us, and we set up a program—just like 9/11, just like BP—where we invited, voluntarily, any minor—any minor from decades ago, now an adult—who had been abused by the church to come into this voluntary program. We paid out, I think, $700 million to $800 million, to victims in dioceses around the country. So there's another example—Camille did most of that—but these programs are all relatively rare. There are thousands of litigations every day, and nothing's going to change that.DL: I had a guest on a few weeks ago, Chris Seeger of Seeger Weiss, who does a lot of work in the mass-tort space. It's interesting: I feel that that space has evolved, and maybe in some ways it's more efficient than it used to be. They have these multi-district litigation panels, they have these bellwether trials, and then things often get settled, once people have a sense of the values. That system and your approach seem to have some similarities, in the sense that you're not individually trying each one of these cases, and you're having somebody with liability come forward and voluntarily pay out money, after some kind of negotiation.KF: Well, there's certainly negotiation in what Chris Seeger does; I'm not sure we have much negotiation. We say, “Here's the amount under the administrative scheme.” It's like in workers' compensation: here's the amount. You don't have to take it. There's nothing to really talk about, unless you have new evidence that we're not aware of. And those programs, when we do design them, seem to work very efficiently.Again, if you ask Camille Biros what was the toughest part of valuing individual claims of sexual-abuse directed at minors, she would say, “These hearings: we gave every person who wanted an opportunity to be heard.” And when they come to see Camille, they don't come to talk about money; they want validation for what they went through. “Believe me, will you? Ken, Camille, believe me.” And when Camille says, “We do believe you,” they immediately, or almost immediately, accept the compensation and sign a release: “I will not sue the Catholic diocese.”DL: So you mentioned there isn't really much negotiation, but you did talk in the book about these sort of “appeals.” You had these two tracks, “Appeals A” and “Appeals B.” Can you talk about that? Did you ever revisit what you had set as the award for a particular victim's family, after hearing from them in person?KF: Sure. Now, remember, those appeals came back to us, not to a court; there's no court involvement. But in 9/11, in BP, if somebody said, “You made a mistake—you didn't account for these profits or this revenue, or you didn't take into account this contract that my dead firefighter husband had that would've given him a lot more money”—of course, we'll revisit that. We invited that. But that's an internal appeals process. The people who calculated the value of the claim are the same people that are going to be looking at revisiting the claim. But again, that's due process, and that's something that we thought was important.DL: You and Camille have been doing this really important work for decades. Since this is, of course, shortly after your 80th birthday, I should ask: do you have future plans? You're tackling some of the most complicated matters, headline-making matters. Would you ever want to retire at some point?KF: I have no intention of retiring. I do agree that when you reach a certain pinnacle in what you've done, you do slow down. We are much more selective in what we do. I used to have maybe 15 mediations going on at once; now, we have one or two matters, like the Los Angeles wildfires. As long as I'm capable, as long as Camille's willing, we'll continue to do it, but we'll be very careful about what we select to do. We don't travel much. The Los Angeles wildfires was largely Zooms, going back and forth. And we're not going to administer that program. We had administered 9/11 and BP; we're trying to move away from that. It's very time-consuming and stressful. So we've accomplished a great deal over the last 50 years—but as long as we can do it, we'll continue to do it.DL: Do you have any junior colleagues who would take over what you and Camille have built?KF: We don't have junior colleagues. There's just the two of us and Cindy Sanzotta, our receptionist. But it's an interesting question: “Who's after Feinberg? Who's next in doing this?” I think there are thousands of people in this country who could do what we do. It is not rocket science. It really isn't. I'll tell you what's difficult: the emotion. If somebody wants to do what we do, you better brace yourself for the emotion, the anger, the frustration, the finger pointing. It goes with the territory. And if you don't have the psychological ability to handle this type of stress, stay away. But I'm sure somebody will be there, and no one's irreplaceable.DL: Well, I know I personally could not handle it. I worked when I was at a law firm on civil litigation over insurance proceeds related to the World Trade Center, and that was a very draining case, and I was very glad to no longer be on it. So I could not do what you and Camille do. But let me ask you, to end this section on a positive note: what would you say is the most rewarding or meaningful or satisfying aspect of the work that you do on these programs?KF: Giving back to the community. Public service. Helping the community heal. Not so much the individuals; the individuals are part of the community. “Every individual can make a difference.” I remember that every day, what John F. Kennedy said: government service is a noble undertaking. So what's most rewarding for me is that although I'm a private practitioner—I am no longer in government service, since my days with Senator Kennedy—I'd like to think that I performed a valuable service for the community, the resilience of the community, the charity exhibited by the community. And that gives me a great sense of self-satisfaction.DL: You absolutely have. It's been amazing, and I'm so grateful for you taking the time to join me.So now, onto our speed round. These are four questions that are standardized. My first question is, what do you like the least about the law? And this can either be the practice of law or law in a more abstract sense.KF: Uncertainty. What I don't like about the law is—and I guess maybe it's the flip side of the best way to get to a result—I don't like the uncertainty of the law. I don't like the fact that until the very end of the process, you don't know if your view and opinion will prevail. And I think losing control over your destiny in that regard is problematic.DL: My second question—and maybe we touched on this a little bit, when we talked about your father's opinions—what would you be if you were not a lawyer?KF: Probably an actor. As I say, I almost became an actor. And I still love theater and the movies and Broadway shows. If my father hadn't given me that advice, I was on the cusp of pursuing a career in the theater.DL: Have you dabbled in anything in your (probably limited) spare time—community theater, anything like that?KF: No, but I certainly have prioritized in my spare time classical music and the peace and optimism it brings to the listener. It's been an important part of my life.DL: My third question is, how much sleep do you get each night?KF: Well, it varies from program to program. I'd like to get seven hours. That's what my doctors tell me: “Ken, very important—more important than pills and exercise and diet—is sleep. Your body needs a minimum of seven hours.” Well, for me, seven hours is rare—it's more like six or even five, and during 9/11 or during Eaton wildfires, it might be more like four or five. And that's not enough, and that is a problem.DL: My last question is, any final words of wisdom, such as career advice or life advice, for my listeners?KF: Yes, I'll give you some career and life advice. It's very simple: don't plan too far ahead. People have this view—you may think you know what you want to do with your career. You may think you know what life holds for you. You don't know. If I've learned anything over the last decades, life has a way of changing the best-laid plans. These 9/11 husbands and wives said goodbye to their children, “we'll see you for dinner,” a perfunctory wave—and they never saw them again. Dust, not even a body. And the idea I tell law students—who say, ”I'm going to be a corporate lawyer,” or “I'm going to be a litigator”—I tell them, “You have no idea what your legal career will look like. Look at Feinberg; he never planned on this. He never thought, in his wildest dreams, that this would be his chosen avenue of the law.”My advice: enjoy the moment. Do what you like now. Don't worry too much about what you'll be doing two years, five years, 10 years, a lifetime ahead of you. It doesn't work that way. Everybody gets thrown curveballs, and that's advice I give to everybody.DL: Well, you did not plan out your career, but it has turned out wonderfully, and the country is better for it. Thank you, Ken, both for your work on all these matters over the years and for joining me today.KF: A privilege and an honor. Thanks, David.DL: Thanks so much to Ken for joining me—and, of course, for his decades of work resolving some of the thorniest disputes in the country, which is truly a form of public service.Thanks to NexFirm for sponsoring the Original Jurisdiction podcast. NexFirm has helped many attorneys to leave Biglaw and launch firms of their own. To explore this opportunity, please contact NexFirm at 212-292-1000 or email careerdevelopment@nexfirm.com to learn more.Thanks to Tommy Harron, my sound engineer here at Original Jurisdiction, and thanks to you, my listeners and readers. To connect with me, please email me at davidlat@substack.com, or find me on Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn, at davidlat, and on Instagram and Threads at davidbenjaminlat.If you enjoyed today's episode, please rate, review, and subscribe. Please subscribe to the Original Jurisdiction newsletter if you don't already, over at davidlat.substack.com. This podcast is free, but it's made possible by paid subscriptions to the newsletter.The next episode should appear on or about Wednesday, November 12. Until then, may your thinking be original and your jurisdiction free of defects.Thanks for reading Original Jurisdiction, and thanks to my paid subscribers for making this publication possible. Subscribers get (1) access to Judicial Notice, my time-saving weekly roundup of the most notable news in the legal world; (2) additional stories reserved for paid subscribers; (3) transcripts of podcast interviews; and (4) the ability to comment on posts. You can email me at davidlat@substack.com with questions or comments, and you can share this post or subscribe using the buttons below. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit davidlat.substack.com/subscribe

John Hancock and Michael Kelley reflect on the death of Missouri Governor Mel Carnahan in a plane crash 25 years ago this week. Carnahan beat John Ashcroft in the election for US Senator, and his wife Jean was appointed to fill the seat.

Today is the 25th anniversary of the deadly plane crash that killed then-Missouri Governor Mel Carnahan, his son Randy and aide Chris Sifford, a former reporter. Governor Carnahan served as governor from 1993 to 2000 and was running in 2000 in a high-profile U.S. Senate race against GOP incumbent John Ashcroft. Governor Carnahan's plane crashed near Goldman Missouri in rainy weather while heading to southeast Missouri's New Madrid County on a campaign stop. Governor Carnahan died on a Monday. 939 the Eagle's Brian Hauswirth and John Marsh joined hosts Randy Tobler and Stephanie Bell live this morning to reflect on that night and week. Brian reports then-Vice President Al Gore was in Jefferson City the next morning to comfort Governor Carnahan's widow, Jean. Brian also reports just a few days later, Governor Carnahan received a state funeral on the Missouri Capitol lawn. Then-President Bill Clinton, then-Vice President Gore and numerous politicians in both parties attended:

Painting Insights Podcast is an online show where Richard K Blades and Simon Renshaw talk to professional painters, gallery owners, frame makers and curators. This week our guest is Michael John Ashcroft.Painting Insights Highlights: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC9383DcEAAJZ51wAihdXOrQ Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/PaintingInsightsPodcast Michael's Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/mj_ashcroft/ Michael's Website: https://michaeljohnashcroft.com Panter and Hall: https://www.panterandhall.com/collections/michael-ashcroft?srsltid=AfmBOopM9OGoOsaTZCL8ApupnLUYA1UU4WBVAG0bkLQQugGZcmAk35FS Mall Galleries: https://www.mallgalleries.org.uk/explore-artists/michael-john-ashcroft-roi Contemporary Six: https://www.contemporarysix.co.uk/viewing-room/11-michael-ashcroft-new-collection/ Hepplestone Fine Art: https://www.hepplestonefineart.com/product-category/artists/michael-ashcroft-artist/ Priory Gallery: https://www.priorybroadway.com/Art_Work.php?id=97&artid=2806&Artist=Michael_John_Ashcroft_ROI_MAFA&Artwork=The_Waldorf_Hotel,_London York Fine Arts: https://www.yorkfinearts.co.uk/artist-michael-john-ashcroft Scotland Art Gallery: https://scotlandart.com/collections/michael-ashcroft?srsltid=AfmBOoqLGJuAuM6W-1hE4rZlhujLlo90g1pbZOLqOmrNQN7ftzBRmZf2 Beaux Arts Bath: https://www.beauxartsbath.co.uk/artists/127-michael-ashcroft/ Simon's Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/simonsez_artwork/ Simon's Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/SimonSezArtwork Richard's Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/richard.k.blades_art/ Richard's Linktree: https://linktr.ee/richardkblades_art

My friend Lisa Graves served in the Justice Dept under Attorneys General Janet Reno and John Ashcroft in both the Clinton and GWBush administrations. She's been chief counsel for nominations under then Senate Judiciary Chair Patrick Leahy, and her CV has many more examples of her legal bona fides. These days, Lisa is Executive Director of the watchdog group True North Research, but she appears regularly on this show in her personal capacity as a citizen, not representing any organization.With all of the actions taken by this new horrific administration over the last 25 days, what I understand is that the vast majority of them are not only illegal but unconstitutional. Today, Lisa Graves returns to the show to try to help me make some sense out of what's going on.

If you're a regular listener of the show then you're familiar with today's guest, Lisa Graves. In addition to being one of my favorite people, she's also one of the most brilliant. She's currently Director of TrueNorthResearch.org. but appears on this show in her personal capacity offering facts and opinions based on her unimpeachable experience working in the DoJ under AGs Janet Reno and John Ashcroft, in the Senate Judiciary Committee as lead counsel for nominations and so much more. True North Research published a primer on what is now likely the playbook for the D'ump 2.0 administration, better known to us all as Project 2025. It's at Project2025Admin.com and includes a profile of Kash Patel, who D'ump has suggested he'll appoint to lead the FBI. OMG. And the EXTreme Court hear a case this morning -- US vs Skrmetti - about whether Tennessee's ban on gender-affirming medical care for minors violates the US Constitution. (Watch out, this slide is already horribly slippery.)

Lisa Graves has graciously agreed to join us again today to help us wade through this ultimate travesty of justice by the high court that is no longer "supreme". Extreme is more fitting.Lisa Graves has unimpeachable legal bona-fides. Among other positions during her career, she served under two US Attorneys General -- Janet Reno during the Clinton administration and John Ashcroft during the W Bush regime. She was chief counsel for nominations under Chair Patrick Leahy on the Senate Judiciary Committee, so was charged with vetting Supreme Court nominees.  I'm always grateful when Lisa brings her expertise here to help us try to figure out wtf is going on. And sadly, that's the only way I can describe what's going on now in the wake of the Extreme Court's gutting of the Chevron deference and conferring "absolute immunity" -- a concept that hadn't existed before yesterday's decision.   --- Send in a voice message: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/nicolesandler/message

In this week's essay, John discusses Mothers's Day, playing tennis with the Attorney General, medical scares, and more   Notebook Entries: Notebook 19, page 16. April 2011 Is it possible, through applied thought, to become systematic in an approach to life? If you were to do that how would you proceed?  Notebook 16, page 6. July 26, 2005 “I'm here with a bunch of midshipmen and wondering what there is to do around here.” - Boy trying to hit on a girl working @ The Reef in Castine, ME. Notebook 15, page 30. September 2004 Head problems: Sunday 9/5 morning Tuesday 9/7 evening Wednesday 9/8 before lunch Notebook 22, page 22. April 24, 2014 Question:  What did you want to be when you were a kid?  What do you want to be now? Why the difference? Notebook 9. 1995 “That's just the ticket the doctor ordered” Notebook 13. 2001 “Free as a clam” Notebook 17, page 67. December 2006 The man sitting next to me has a face on the boil and garlic and old booze on his breath. When he sleeps, he sighs. For this leg of the flight I am wrapped in his breathy gumbo. Notebook 15, page 7. April 2004 “In all these there are messages for those who use their reason.” - Quran quotation Notebook 15, page 80. 2005 Would like to meet her. Notebook 54. July 26, 2020 “Writing requires a reader. You can't do it alone.” - John Cheever Notebook 15, page 71. 2005 In the light of sobriety not sure what this means Notebook 13. March 2001 Yesterday I played tennis with John Ashcroft the atty. general of the U.S. Notebook 13, page 108. December 11, 2001 Anne just called. There is one little heartbeat beating in her today. Everything is okay for this hurdle. I must say, I was really worried. Notebook 20, page 10. December 24, 2013 “Sometimes Dad says weird stuff, just ignore him” - Anne to kids about me Notebook 15, page 84. “Life goes on,” Hayawi says. “We are in the middle of a war [in Iraq] and we still smoke the water pipe.” Notebook 45, page 24. April 16, 2019 Our savior lives by the manner in which we live. Notebook 19, page 23. 2011 People on their mobile phones in England say goodbye a lot: “Cheers, alright then, speak to you soon, ta.” (That's four ways of saying goodbye). Amelia tells the story of a man who thanked a ticket-taker by saying “Ta, magical, cheers.” References: Disaster on the Penobscot - John Henry Fay for Naval History Magazine One Man's Meat by E.B. White The House at Allen Cove I E.B. White House Tour - New England Magazine Little Plastic Castle - Ani Defranco “Two Years of War: Taking Stock” - Anthony Shadid for the Washington Post   Podcast production by Cheyna Roth. Email us at navelgazingpodcast@gmail.com Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In this week's essay, John discusses Mothers's Day, playing tennis with the Attorney General, medical scares, and more   Notebook Entries: Notebook 19, page 16. April 2011 Is it possible, through applied thought, to become systematic in an approach to life? If you were to do that how would you proceed?  Notebook 16, page 6. July 26, 2005 “I'm here with a bunch of midshipmen and wondering what there is to do around here.” - Boy trying to hit on a girl working @ The Reef in Castine, ME. Notebook 15, page 30. September 2004 Head problems: Sunday 9/5 morning Tuesday 9/7 evening Wednesday 9/8 before lunch Notebook 22, page 22. April 24, 2014 Question:  What did you want to be when you were a kid?  What do you want to be now? Why the difference? Notebook 9. 1995 “That's just the ticket the doctor ordered” Notebook 13. 2001 “Free as a clam” Notebook 17, page 67. December 2006 The man sitting next to me has a face on the boil and garlic and old booze on his breath. When he sleeps, he sighs. For this leg of the flight I am wrapped in his breathy gumbo. Notebook 15, page 7. April 2004 “In all these there are messages for those who use their reason.” - Quran quotation Notebook 15, page 80. 2005 Would like to meet her. Notebook 54. July 26, 2020 “Writing requires a reader. You can't do it alone.” - John Cheever Notebook 15, page 71. 2005 In the light of sobriety not sure what this means Notebook 13. March 2001 Yesterday I played tennis with John Ashcroft the atty. general of the U.S. Notebook 13, page 108. December 11, 2001 Anne just called. There is one little heartbeat beating in her today. Everything is okay for this hurdle. I must say, I was really worried. Notebook 20, page 10. December 24, 2013 “Sometimes Dad says weird stuff, just ignore him” - Anne to kids about me Notebook 15, page 84. “Life goes on,” Hayawi says. “We are in the middle of a war [in Iraq] and we still smoke the water pipe.” Notebook 45, page 24. April 16, 2019 Our savior lives by the manner in which we live. Notebook 19, page 23. 2011 People on their mobile phones in England say goodbye a lot: “Cheers, alright then, speak to you soon, ta.” (That's four ways of saying goodbye). Amelia tells the story of a man who thanked a ticket-taker by saying “Ta, magical, cheers.” References: Disaster on the Penobscot - John Henry Fay for Naval History Magazine One Man's Meat by E.B. White The House at Allen Cove I E.B. White House Tour - New England Magazine Little Plastic Castle - Ani Defranco “Two Years of War: Taking Stock” - Anthony Shadid for the Washington Post   Podcast production by Cheyna Roth. Email us at navelgazingpodcast@gmail.com Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In this week's essay, John discusses Mothers's Day, playing tennis with the Attorney General, medical scares, and more   Notebook Entries: Notebook 19, page 16. April 2011 Is it possible, through applied thought, to become systematic in an approach to life? If you were to do that how would you proceed?  Notebook 16, page 6. July 26, 2005 “I'm here with a bunch of midshipmen and wondering what there is to do around here.” - Boy trying to hit on a girl working @ The Reef in Castine, ME. Notebook 15, page 30. September 2004 Head problems: Sunday 9/5 morning Tuesday 9/7 evening Wednesday 9/8 before lunch Notebook 22, page 22. April 24, 2014 Question:  What did you want to be when you were a kid?  What do you want to be now? Why the difference? Notebook 9. 1995 “That's just the ticket the doctor ordered” Notebook 13. 2001 “Free as a clam” Notebook 17, page 67. December 2006 The man sitting next to me has a face on the boil and garlic and old booze on his breath. When he sleeps, he sighs. For this leg of the flight I am wrapped in his breathy gumbo. Notebook 15, page 7. April 2004 “In all these there are messages for those who use their reason.” - Quran quotation Notebook 15, page 80. 2005 Would like to meet her. Notebook 54. July 26, 2020 “Writing requires a reader. You can't do it alone.” - John Cheever Notebook 15, page 71. 2005 In the light of sobriety not sure what this means Notebook 13. March 2001 Yesterday I played tennis with John Ashcroft the atty. general of the U.S. Notebook 13, page 108. December 11, 2001 Anne just called. There is one little heartbeat beating in her today. Everything is okay for this hurdle. I must say, I was really worried. Notebook 20, page 10. December 24, 2013 “Sometimes Dad says weird stuff, just ignore him” - Anne to kids about me Notebook 15, page 84. “Life goes on,” Hayawi says. “We are in the middle of a war [in Iraq] and we still smoke the water pipe.” Notebook 45, page 24. April 16, 2019 Our savior lives by the manner in which we live. Notebook 19, page 23. 2011 People on their mobile phones in England say goodbye a lot: “Cheers, alright then, speak to you soon, ta.” (That's four ways of saying goodbye). Amelia tells the story of a man who thanked a ticket-taker by saying “Ta, magical, cheers.” References: Disaster on the Penobscot - John Henry Fay for Naval History Magazine One Man's Meat by E.B. White The House at Allen Cove I E.B. White House Tour - New England Magazine Little Plastic Castle - Ani Defranco “Two Years of War: Taking Stock” - Anthony Shadid for the Washington Post   Podcast production by Cheyna Roth. Email us at navelgazingpodcast@gmail.com Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In this week's essay, John discusses Mothers's Day, playing tennis with the Attorney General, medical scares, and more.   Notebook Entries: Notebook 19, page 16. April 2011 Is it possible, through applied thought, to become systematic in an approach to life? If you were to do that how would you proceed?  Notebook 16, page 6. July 26, 2005 “I'm here with a bunch of midshipmen and wondering what there is to do around here.” - Boy trying to hit on a girl working @ The Reef in Castine, ME. Notebook 15, page 30. September 2004 Head problems: Sunday 9/5 morning Tuesday 9/7 evening Wednesday 9/8 before lunch Notebook 22, page 22. April 24, 2014 Question:  What did you want to be when you were a kid?  What do you want to be now? Why the difference? Notebook 9. 1995 “That's just the ticket the doctor ordered” Notebook 13. 2001 “Free as a clam” Notebook 17, page 67. December 2006 The man sitting next to me has a face on the boil and garlic and old booze on his breath. When he sleeps, he sighs. For this leg of the flight I am wrapped in his breathy gumbo. Notebook 15, page 7. April 2004 “In all these there are messages for those who use their reason.” - Quran quotation Notebook 15, page 80. 2005 Would like to meet her. Notebook 54. July 26, 2020 “Writing requires a reader. You can't do it alone.” - John Cheever Notebook 15, page 71. 2005 In the light of sobriety not sure what this means Notebook 13. March 2001 Yesterday I played tennis with John Ashcroft the atty. general of the U.S. Notebook 13, page 108. December 11, 2001 Anne just called. There is one little heartbeat beating in her today. Everything is okay for this hurdle. I must say, I was really worried. Notebook 20, page 10. December 24, 2013 “Sometimes Dad says weird stuff, just ignore him” - Anne to kids about me Notebook 15, page 84. “Life goes on,” Hayawi says. “We are in the middle of a war [in Iraq] and we still smoke the water pipe.” Notebook 45, page 24. April 16, 2019 Our savior lives by the manner in which we live. Notebook 19, page 23. 2011 People on their mobile phones in England say goodbye a lot: “Cheers, alright then, speak to you soon, ta.” (That's four ways of saying goodbye). Amelia tells the story of a man who thanked a ticket-taker by saying “Ta, magical, cheers.” References: Disaster on the Penobscot - John Henry Fay for Naval History Magazine One Man's Meat by E.B. White The House at Allen Cove I E.B. White House Tour - New England Magazine Little Plastic Castle - Ani Defranco “Two Years of War: Taking Stock” - Anthony Shadid for the Washington Post Want to listen to Navel Gazing uninterrupted? Subscribe to Slate Plus to immediately unlock ad-free listening to Navel Gazing and all your other favorite Slate podcasts. Subscribe now on Apple Podcasts by clicking “Try Free” at the top of our show page. Or, visit slate.com/navelgazingplus to get access wherever you listen.   Podcast production by Cheyna Roth. Email us at navelgazingpodcast@gmail.com

In this week's study, I finish up with in Chapter 18. Before I get into the study, I talk about the Boys Scouts changing their titled to Scouting America so they can cater to the gender identity. I take a look at the Steward Health Care Systems scandal on their bankruptcy and then follow the money trail back to Cerberus Capital Management, which included Dan Qualye and Blackwater which lists John Ashcroft both under the Bush Administration. Like I stated before, Are you starting to see the picture? Once again we see the global elite in control. Listen to me, the beast system is all ready taken places! Are you awake to see it?23   And the light of a candle shall shine no more at all in thee = Another image of desolation, as if every light were put out, and there were total darkness. And the voice of the bridegroom and of the bride shall be heard no more at all in thee = The merry and cheerful voice of the marriage procession in the streets (notes on Matthew 25:1-7), or the cheerful, glad voice of the newly-married couple in their own dwelling (notes on John 3:29). In other words, life as usual is over, no more marriages, no more reproduction.For thy merchants were the great men of the earth = Those who dealt with thee were the rich, and among them were even nobles and princes; and now that they trade with thee no more there is occasion for lamentation and sorrow. For by thy sorceries were all nations deceived = This is stated as a reason for the ruin that had come upon her. It is a common representation of the religious community in Jerusalem where Satan sits that she has deceived or deluded the nations of the earth and no representation ever made accords more with facts as they have occurred. The word “sorceries” here refers to the various arts the tricks impostures, and false pretences by which this has been done. See the notes on Rev. 9:21. Sorceries = pharakeia (far-mak-i'-ah) in the original language.  Pharmacy or even Big Pharma! It is a reference to magical arts and sorcery like that you will recall that Jezebel used in 2 Kings 9:22.  It is spoken of even in the context of ancient Babylon in Isaiah 47:12. 24  And in her was found the blood of prophets and of saints = Such as before mentioned, in verse 20 this is another reason of her destruction, besides her luxury and idolatry, namely, her shedding the blood of the saints, with which she is said to be drunk, and therefore blood is now given her to drink, and of all that were slain upon the earth = not only of those that have been slain in the city of Jerusalem, but of all those that have been slain throughout the world; they being slain by her order, or with her consent, and she conniving at it, encouraging it, and therefore will be justly chargeable with it all; Once again some Prophecy borrowed from Old Testament Babylon:(v21) Ezek 26:21 – “I will bring terrors on you and you will be no more; though you will be sought, you will never be found again,” declares Adonai Yahweh.”(v22) Ezek 26:13 – “So I will silence the sound of your songs, and the sound of your harps will be heard no more.”(v23) Jer 25:10 – “Moreover, I will take from them the voice of joy and the voice of gladness, the voice of the bridegroom and the voice of the bride, the sound of the millstones and the light of the lamp.” (v24) Jer 51:49 – “Indeed Babylon is to fall for the slain of Israel, As also for Babylon the slain of all the earth have fallen.”Join me as we go Chapter by Chapter, Verse by Verse, Unraveling the Words of Yahweh!Have any questions? Feel free to email me at keitner@netzero.net

I'm always honored when Lisa Graves joins me to lend her legal expertise to the discussion about the trials and tribulations of TFG and, of course, the machinations of the once Supreme, now Extreme, Court. Lisa has the bona fides... she served as Deputy Assistant Attorney General in the Office of Policy Development/Legal Policy at the U.S. Department of Justice under Attorneys General Janet Reno and John Ashcroft, Chief Counsel for Nominations for Senator Patrick Leahy on the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee, Deputy Chief of the Article III Judges Division of the Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts with oversight of the Financial Disclosure Office and more, and as an adjunct law professor at George Washington University Law School. She also worked as the Senior Legislative Strategist for the ACLU on national security and civil liberties, and held other posts. Although Lisa generously shares her knowledge with us on this show, she does so in her capacity as a private citizen. These days, her day job is as the founder and Executive Director of True North Research, a national investigative watchdog group that works with journalists and other researchers to shine a bright light on the dark money fueling regressive agendas targeting vital institutions in our republic, such as our courts and public schools. Graves is one of the nation's foremost experts in exposing how special interests distort public policy and try to thwart the public's interest in a thriving and inclusive democracy and to impede measures to protect our environment and mitigate climate change. I don't run through her CV and experience as often as I should when she's on the show, so I wanted to put it down in writing... Today, Lisa joins me to talk about the beginning of the first-ever criminal trial of a former president, about that former guy's inability to follow the most basic rules of decorum inside a court of law (or anywhere else for that matter), David Pecker's testimony that proves Trump talks about himself when he decries "FAKE NEWS" and more. On the SCOTUS front, tomorrow - the final day they'll hear arguments this term - they'll hear Trump's farce of a claim that he enjoys "absolute immunity" as a former president... of course today, the antediluvian men on the court showed that they believe they should control every aspect of a woman's life, including her health care. --- Send in a voice message: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/nicolesandler/message

Lisa Graves is the founder and Executive Director of True North Research, a national investigative watchdog group that exposes the shadowy machinations of dark money funders like Leonard Leo, Barre Seid, Harlan Crow, Charles Koch, Dick Uihlein, and Rob Arkley, and their front groups. She served as Deputy Assistant Attorney General in the Office of Policy Development/Legal Policy at the U.S. Department of Justice under Attorneys General Janet Reno and John Ashcroft, Chief Counsel for Nominations for Senator Patrick Leahy on the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee, Deputy Chief of the Article III Judges Division of the Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts with oversight of the Financial Disclosure Office and more. She also launched the award-winning ALECexposed.org investigation, KochDocs, and other projects. Her op-eds have run in the most prominent newspapers and magazines in the country, and she is a frequent guest on MSNBC. From 2009-2017, she led the Center for Media and Democracy.In this discussion with Greg Olear, Graves discusses her work with True North Research, how she shares an alma mater with one of the most notorious dark money maestros, all the stuff that went on during Brett Kavanaugh's FIRST confirmation hearing, the failures of the Roberts Court and John Roberts, the Clarence & Ginni Thomas corruption, and more. Plus: a gift idea!Prevail is sponsored by BetterHelp. Get 10% off your first month at betterhelp.com/gregFollow Lisa:https://twitter.com/thelisagravesTrue North Research:https://truenorthresearch.org/Her 2018 Slate piece about Brett Kavanaugh:https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2018/09/judge-brett-kavanaugh-should-be-impeached-for-lying-during-his-confirmation-hearings.htmlAnd the one in TIME:https://time.com/5398191/brett-kavanaugh-supreme-court-senators/ Subscribe to the PREVAIL newsletter:https://gregolear.substack.com/aboutWould you like to tell us more about you? http://survey.podtrac.com/start-survey.aspx?pubid=BffJOlI7qQcF&ver=short

Perspectives on the Role of the Nation’s Chief Legal OfficerA Conversation with Three U.S. Attorneys General Featuring:Hon. John Ashcroft, Former U.S Attorney General (2001-2005)Hon. William P. Barr, Former U.S Attorney General (1991-1993 and 2019-2020)Hon. Jeff Sessions, Former U.S Attorney General (2017-2018)Moderator: Beth Williams, Board Member, U.S. Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board; former Assistant Attorney General for the Office of Legal Policy

It's the last week before Christmas and we're still here. With a lot of legal issues popping up on Friday and in our near future, I thought today would be a great day to invite Lisa Graves back to the show. Lisa has those legal bona fides -- she  served as Deputy Assistant Attorney General in the Office of Policy Development/Legal Policy at the U.S. Department of Justice under Attorneys General Janet Reno and John Ashcroft, Chief Counsel for Nominations for Senator Patrick Leahy on the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee, Deputy Chief of the Article III Judges Division of the Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts with oversight of the Financial Disclosure Office and more, and as an adjunct law professor at George Washington University Law School. She also worked as the Senior Legislative Strategist for the ACLU on national security and civil liberties, and held other posts.  These days, she serves as Executive Director and Editor of TrueNorthResearch.org, where she continues the work she's championed over the years, exposing people and organizations like the Koch Brothers, ALEC, Leonard Leo and others of that ilk. Today we'll talk Rudy, Ruby & Shaye, Clarence & Ginny and the lack of Supreme ethics, Jack Smith and his game of leapfrog the appeals court and more.... --- Send in a voice message: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/nicolesandler/message

Joan Carr served as Chief of Staff for three GA U.S. Senators. A Democrat, A statesman and the first woman GOP senator. She'll tell us about it. And Rep. Brent Cox gets a resolution pass in support of Israel and condemning the actions of Hamas on Oct 7. Thirty Dems walked out. And, John Ashcroft from the Ruthless Podcast joins to recap the debate and a little SEC sports politics. It's been a long week.

In this enlightening episode, host Dustin Olson and GOP strategist Matt Wylie dissect key political campaign strategies and the evolution of the GOP's ground game. Wylie brings decades of experience to the table, offering an insider's view of landmark campaigns that have shaped the GOP's tactics. The dialogue opens with Wylie's recollections of a Massachusetts special election that he and host Dustin Olson worked on together, showcasing innovative tactics despite a close loss. He highlights the shift in GOP campaign tactics over the years, focusing on voter targeting and engagement. The discussion underlines the importance of authenticity in politics, drawing from various candidates' experiences. Wylie shares insights from John Ashcroft's Senate race, emphasizing political values and strategic campaign decisions. The episode also delves into the necessity of grassroots tactics, opposition research, and the importance of preparing for personal attacks in campaigns. Toward the end, Wylie and Olson critique the GOP's current reliance on social media, advocating for a renewed focus on direct voter engagement and grassroots efforts, especially in new demographics and movements like Parental Rights. Listeners can seek campaign advice from Wylie at Matt@MattWylie.com. For more insights, LIKE, SUBSCRIBE, and leave a Review to support the show. Visit www.PoliticalTradeSecets.com for additional resources.

In this episode I have on Katie who you guys may know of on twitter as @mildred_florsh! We discuss the DC Snipers John Allen Muhammad and Lee Boyd Malvo including Muhammad's military service and all the trouble he would cause during this time while simultaneously climbing his way up the ladder. We discuss his strained relationship with his wife, his wife's connection to John Ashcroft. Yeah, you read that right. We also cover Lee Boyd Malvo's rough childhood and his manipulation (brainwashing?) which kind of gives some PTK Manchurian candidate vibes which we dive deeper into in the second part. We discuss the murders, Muhammad's criminal career, his plan to start a compound to train children and much more. This was a really fun conversation, and the second part is even crazier so stay tuned for that! Make sure to go follow Katie on twitter!

Well, now we know that imminent can mean eventually! Fani Willis said charges against the former guy were imminent way back in January. But last night, right around 8pm ET, the Grand Jury filed back into the Fulton County courtroom and handed the judge the indictment-- a whopping 98 pages, 41 counts and, in addition to Cheeto Musselini, 18 other defendants and 30 un-indicted co-conspirators.As today is that other Tuesday, GottaLaff is here. And we're joined by the go-to legal expert of the Nicole Sandler Show, Lisa Graves, former Deputy Assistant Attorney General under both Janet Reno and John Ashcroft in the Clinton and W Bush administrations, now founder and director of True North Research.Now that's an indictment panel I'd listen to!

Responding to the recent revelations about serious ethical breaches at the US Supreme Court, the Senate Judiciary Committee this morning held a hearing on Supreme Court ethics... or the lack thereof.It was another frustrating journey through Opposite World. Instead of yelling at the TV, I invited Lisa Graves to join us today to weigh in on the situation.Lisa is no stranger to the Senate Judiciary Committee, having served as its Chief Counsel for Nominations under then-chair Patrick Leahy - or to the DOJ where she was Deputy Assistant Attorney General under both Janet Reno and John Ashcroft.Today, Lisa heads up TrueNorth Research. She usually appears on this show as a private citizen speaking for herself and not for her organization, today she'll appear in both roles, offering her own opinion as well as the statement of the watchdog organization she leads.

So many legal issues in the news, and the only law classes I ever took in college were broadcast law. That's why I call on Lisa Graves so often. She's brilliant, with the legal background to prove it. Today, Lisa leads TrueNorthResearch.org, while still overseeing Kochdocs.org and ALECexposed, and other campaign that have reported truths we need to know.She's also worked on the inside, in the DOJ, holding a few different positions through the years. But Lisa Graves was Deputy Assistant Attorney General under both Janet Reno in the Clinton Administration and John Ashcroft in the W Bush years.So much to talk about today. Lisa lives in Wisconsin where they're in the final days of the WI Supreme Court elections, which will have national ramifications (she'll explain). And I certainly want to ask about all of TFG's legal woes that appear to be piling up around him while he seems to be the guy the Republicans will again nominate to run for president in two years.Like I said, lots to talk with Lisa Graves about today!

Rebecca Lambe is often described as the architect of Nevada's “Reid Machine” that has shaped politics in the state over the past 20 years. In this episode, she talks cutting her teeth in Missouri politics with both Governor Mel Carnahan and Senator Jean Carnahan and then moving west to Nevada to build the state Democratic political organization with Senator Harry Reid...plus co-founding Senate Majority PAC to build and protect a Democratic Senate Majority. This conversation contains both Rebecca's memorable campaign stories and case studies, as well as incredibly practical nuts-and-bolts insight into successful electoral politics. IN THIS EPISODE…Rebecca grows up in Alaska as the only girl in a large family…The movie that inspired Rebecca's career path toward journalism and ultimately politics…Campus activism at the University of Missouri sparks Rebecca's career toward politics…Rebecca's entry into the world of Mel and Jean Carnahan…The future US Senator Rebecca knew at Mizzou…Rebecca talks early political lessons learned from Missouri Governor Mel Carnahan…Rebecca's memories of the tragic Carnahan plane crash in October 2000…What Rebecca learned from managing a very narrow loss for Senator Jean Carnahan in 2002…The non-political reason why Rebecca moved west from Missouri after the 2002 race…Rebecca's intersection with Senator Harry Reid & early days growing the Reid Machine…Rebecca demystifies what (and who) the Reid Machine is…Rebecca's thoughts on what made Harry Reid such an effective political operator…The story behind Harry Reid winning a tough 2010 re-election…Rebecca breaks down the 2022 re-election of Senator Catherine Cortez Masto…A post-mortem on the much-discussed Nevada congressional redistricting…Rebecca on the 2022 Governors race and legacy of Steve Sisolak…How Rebecca approaches her role on IE races at Senate Majority PAC…Some of the advice gives to younger operatives…Two of Rebecca's favorite spots to visit in Nevada… AND 30% unemployment, 428 votes, Alaska drivers' licenses, Sharron Angle, John Ashcroft, Carl Bernstein, Joe Biden, Bob Bigelow, the Bootheel, James Browning, Randy Carnahan, Robin Carnahan, Citizens United, Club for Growth, computer programmers, constant deluges, controversial student curators, Culinary 226, Tom Daschle, deep-pocketed benefactors, Paul Dunn, durable boots on the ground, Marc Farinella, Scott Fairchild, fellow travelers, Julie Gibson, Al Gore, Martin Heinrich, John Kerry, Adam Laxalt, the Legion of Black Collegians, the long game, Sue Lowden, Ty Matsdorf, Mizzou, Mike Muir, Barack Obama, the PTA, Planned Parenthood, JB Poersch, precipitous drop-offs, Jon Ralston, Rolla, Karl Rove, Searchlight, Saul Shorr, Chris Sifford, spade work, straight arrows, Roy Temple, Dina Titus, Harry Truman, Mark Twain, whistlestop tours, Roger Wilson, Bob Woodard, Fred Yang…& more!

Host: Kevin Smith Dives into the weekly news most impactful to the HeartlandHEADLINESElection deniers face a nationwide wave of pushback MSN - https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/other/election-deniers-face-a-nationwide-wave-of-pushbacks/ar-AA17widQVoices against Republican push to make it harder to amend the Missouri constitution gain conservative support StL Today - https://www.stltoday.com/news/local/govt-and-politics/gop-bid-to-make-it-harder-to-amend-missouri-constitution-draws-conservative-opposition/article_0a88a4ee-3bf9-5fd4-a0f2-a186f774149a.htmlLIGHTNING ROUNDAlabamaBuild a better catfishOutdoor Life - https://www.outdoorlife.com/fishing/alligator-catfish-hybrid-alabama/?fbclid=IwAR3aRzF2ieI5BLrwpolXdPEQ1tYVXMPdQfVfxqLubGtRDxr-IKTHzvlucGE&mibextid=Zxz2cZKentuckyTrigger ban on abortion to remain in effect. Lexington Herald Leader - https://www.kentucky.com/news/politics-government/article272525366.htmlIowa Asset limit for SNAPIowa Capital Dispatch - https://iowacapitaldispatch.com/2023/02/15/bill-could-make-iowans-with-cars-savings-ineligible-for-snap-medicaid/KansasLegislators seek to erase trans peoples legally.PBS - https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/kansas-push-to-define-sex-decried-as-erasing-transgender-peopleGOP disdain for small governmentKansas Reflector - https://kansasreflector.com/2023/02/15/kansas-cities-push-back-against-house-bill-nullifying-local-anti-discrimination-ordinances/MissouriRockwood fires back against racist parent. KMOX - https://www.audacy.com/kmox/articles/news/school-responds-to-complaint-about-book-on-black-astronautBlack leaders rally.AP - https://apnews.com/article/politics-mississippi-st-louis-missouri-813d91d638a6822fdfbeb613ea523f53Missouri's Don't Say Gay Law ABC - https://abcnews.go.com/US/new-missouri-bill-takes-dont-gay-law/story?id=96977642OklahomaParental Rights still at stake post Marriage Equality The 19th - https://19thnews.org/2023/02/oklahoma-judge-parental-rights-lgbtq-same-sex-marriage/South CarolinaNikki Haley shows love for neo-confederates.Meidas Touch - https://twitter.com/MeidasTouch/status/1625639934999797760

Host: Kevin Smith Dives into the weekly news most impactful to the HeartlandHEADLINESElection deniers face a nationwide wave of pushback MSN - https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/other/election-deniers-face-a-nationwide-wave-of-pushbacks/ar-AA17widQVoices against Republican push to make it harder to amend the Missouri constitution gain conservative support StL Today - https://www.stltoday.com/news/local/govt-and-politics/gop-bid-to-make-it-harder-to-amend-missouri-constitution-draws-conservative-opposition/article_0a88a4ee-3bf9-5fd4-a0f2-a186f774149a.htmlLIGHTNING ROUNDAlabamaBuild a better catfishOutdoor Life - https://www.outdoorlife.com/fishing/alligator-catfish-hybrid-alabama/?fbclid=IwAR3aRzF2ieI5BLrwpolXdPEQ1tYVXMPdQfVfxqLubGtRDxr-IKTHzvlucGE&mibextid=Zxz2cZKentuckyTrigger ban on abortion to remain in effect. Lexington Herald Leader - https://www.kentucky.com/news/politics-government/article272525366.htmlIowa Asset limit for SNAPIowa Capital Dispatch - https://iowacapitaldispatch.com/2023/02/15/bill-could-make-iowans-with-cars-savings-ineligible-for-snap-medicaid/KansasLegislators seek to erase trans peoples legally.PBS - https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/kansas-push-to-define-sex-decried-as-erasing-transgender-peopleGOP disdain for small governmentKansas Reflector - https://kansasreflector.com/2023/02/15/kansas-cities-push-back-against-house-bill-nullifying-local-anti-discrimination-ordinances/MissouriRockwood fires back against racist parent. KMOX - https://www.audacy.com/kmox/articles/news/school-responds-to-complaint-about-book-on-black-astronautBlack leaders rally.AP - https://apnews.com/article/politics-mississippi-st-louis-missouri-813d91d638a6822fdfbeb613ea523f53Missouri's Don't Say Gay Law ABC - https://abcnews.go.com/US/new-missouri-bill-takes-dont-gay-law/story?id=96977642OklahomaParental Rights still at stake post Marriage Equality The 19th - https://19thnews.org/2023/02/oklahoma-judge-parental-rights-lgbtq-same-sex-marriage/South CarolinaNikki Haley shows love for neo-confederates.Meidas Touch - https://twitter.com/MeidasTouch/status/1625639934999797760

Welcome to the Instant Trivia podcast episode 730, where we ask the best trivia on the Internet. Round 1. Category: Bear Feat 1: At about 9 feet and 1,700 pounds, this large bear shares its name with an Alaskan island. Kodiak. 2: The Asiatic black bear also bears the beary nice name of these Indian mountains where it dwells. Himalayas. 3: Often named Bruin, this species is the most likely to be found in children's stories of Europe and Asia. Brown bear. 4: This smallest bear species bears the name of a heavenly object. Sun bear. 5: Spectacled bears are the only species found on this continent. South America. Round 2. Category: "Z" Abbreviations 1: Z.Hr.; it's time to go. Zero. 2: The Z in ZIP code is short for this. Zone (Improvement Plan). 3: Book of the Bible abbreviated Zech.. Zechariah. 4: You may answer with zeal that zl is short for this currency. Zloty. 5: The abbreviations for the 2 elements whose names begin with Z. Zn and Zr (Zinc and Zirconium). Round 3. Category: Tv Occupations 1: Cliff Huxtable, Richard Kimble and Galen Adams. physicians (doctors). 2: Benson DuBois, Giles French and Lurch. butlers. 3: Charlie Moore, Gabe Kotter and Robinson Peepers. teachers. 4: Jack Tripper, Wishbone and Hop Sing. chefs. 5: Leland McKenzie, Ben Matlock and Bentley Gregg. lawyers. Round 4. Category: The Contest 1: 1984 Walter Mondale got his 13 electoral votes by winning D.C. and this state. Minnesota. 2: In 1998 Rabbit Hash, Kentucky elected Goofy, one of these, as mayor; sadly, the mayor had to be "put down" in 2001. a dog. 3: Peter Ueberroth finished sixth in a 2003 race for this state's highest office, just ahead of Larry Flynt. California. 4: This George W. Bush Cabinet member lost his 2000 Senate race to a man who died a month before the election. John Ashcroft. 5: In 1884 a booster's attack on democratic "Rum, Romanism and Rebellion" backfired on this Down Easter. James Blaine. Round 5. Category: "Pun" Day 1: A small hole or wound made by a sharp object. a puncture. 2: Strong smelling or strong tasting. pungent. 3: Lately this word has come to mean a TV talking head on political topics. pundit. 4: A young rebel, or something to light fireworks. a punk. 5: It precedes "Arenas" in the name of a Chilean city, one of the southernmost in the world. Punta. Thanks for listening! Come back tomorrow for more exciting trivia! Special thanks to https://blog.feedspot.com/trivia_podcasts/

Season 2 baby!! We kick off our new investigation by beginning our deep dive into the 2004 Gerald Shea Memo which asks the question: "What the hell was the Israeli government getting into leading up to 9/11?" In this first episode we lay out the history of Shea himself and his memo; then, we walk through the preliminary findings as a way of setting the table for the stories to come. This episode also features the debut of PNAC Poetry Corner or, "How Erik Learned To Stop Worrying And Love The Wichita Vortex Sutra", shit is gonna get emotional on this one folks. All of that along with John Ashcroft's personal email!? You'll have to tune in and find out!

This week the Extreme Supreme Court heard two consequential cases that could affect millions of same sex married couples, and could enable state legislatures to upend our election systems, potentially allowing what Trump attempted in 2020 but couldn't. Today, we're joined by friend of the show Lisa Graves, currently executive director/founder of TrueNorthResearch, who served as Deputy Assistant Attorney General under AG's Janet Reno and John Ashcroft in the Clinton and W Bush administrations, so she knows of what she speaks! She'll also weigh in on the possible criminal referrals to DOJ by the 1/6 committee, and the strange provision attached to the NDAA that seems to give more cover to Supreme Court justices and their families to sidestep ethics rules. And of course, there's the news that broke early this morning that Kyrsten Sinema is not a Democrat. Didn't we already know that? (I know this is different, but I had to say it!)

THE VIC PORCELLI SHOW 0:00 SEG 1 David Stokes of The Show Me Institute https://twitter.com/davidcstokes  18:04 SEG 2 28:17 SEG 3 Missouri Secretary of State, John Ashcroft https://twitter.com/JayAshcroftMO See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

THE VIC PORCELLI SHOW 0:00 SEG 1 David Stokes of The Show Me Institute https://twitter.com/davidcstokes  18:04 SEG 2 28:17 SEG 3 Missouri Secretary of State, John Ashcroft https://twitter.com/JayAshcroftMO See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

One more week in this election season, and it can't end soon enough. If sensible people ever regain power, they really must shorten our election seasons, because this has gotten ridiculous already. And with tensions riding so high, I'd expect the worst in the final stretch. I'm afraid the crazy man who attacked Paul Pelosi won't be the last right-wing extremist to get violent. There's a lot of news happening today. I'll attempt to deal with much of it... I'll call on Lisa Graves today... She's my go-to legal expert, as she served in a number of capacities within the US Dept of Justice, including as Deputy Assistant Attorney General for nominations under both Janet Reno and John Ashcroft... She'll weigh in on the Supreme Court's hearing yesterday on the future of Affirmative Action, plus two rulings they handed down today (Lindsey Graham must testify in GA; Trump slithers out of having to turn over his tax returns, again, at least for now). The victims of the Marjorie Stoneman Douglas HS shooting in Parkland get to tell the murderer exactly what they think of him today before he's officially sentenced to 36 life sentences with no parole. Elon Musk is driving away tons of Tweeters from Twitter. Israel is voting in its 5th election in four years and could return Netanyahu to power. And it's November! Voting ends in seven days, and open enrollment for Obamacare through the ACA has begun at healthcare.gov. I think that's enough to get us started....

John Ashcroft teaches topically.

There is no such thing as a slow news day any more. With so much happening, we'll just hone in on two stories today. And they both deal with disaster, though of different varieties. Hurricane Ian - huge disaster. Here in Florida, where I live, the damage and despair is everywhere, even in the safe pocket in the southeastern section that probably the safest place to be in the whole state. Today, I think everyone here is feeling incredibly lucky. In fact, we should all go out and buy lottery tickets. But the reality is, we're far from lucky. The losses will be enormous, in both lives and treasure. And good luck if you hope to ever be able to purchase homeowners insurance in Florida again. Today, I'll speak with Daily Kos' senior staff writer April Siese who wrote today, "We need to drastically rethink what recovery looks like as the climate crisis worsens." But we'll start the show with our friend Lisa Graves, former Deputy Assistant Attorney General under AGs Janet Reno and John Ashcroft (in the Clinton and W administrations), now founder/ editor at True North Research. Lisa is my go-to expert on all legal/justice issues, and boy do we have a doozy! 'Judge' Aileen Cannon was appointed by Trump; Trump hand-picked her to do his bidding regarding the cache of classified documents found at Mar-a-Lago. Her first rulings dealing with the special master were overturned on appeal, but she gave Trump cover again on Thursday with a ruling that even this non-attorney can tell you was grade a bullshit. I'll ask Lisa about this latest head-scratcher. And of course, we'll talk about the wife of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas being an election denier and doubling down on that sentiment yesterday when she answered questions from the House Select Committee investigating January 6.

Due to shenanigans here on the pod Billy Ray Cyrus was chosen for 2 straight weeks. What seemed like a curse turned out to be a gift, Billy's debut album Some Gave All is way more interesting than any of us remember. Join us this week as we discuss this truly strange album released  May 19, 1992. In this episode we discuss caning, Maya Angelou, sandwiches, OJ Simpson, Superman, 50 Shades of Gray, John Ashcroft, Herms and so much more! Hatepod.com | TW: @AlbumHatePod | IG: @hatePod | hatePodMail@gmail.com  Episode Outline: Top of the show "Do you hate it?" Personal History History of the Band  General Thoughts Song by Song - What do they mean!?! How Did it Do Reviews Post Episode "Do you hate it?"

Erik is back from his day job at the CIA, we recorded this before Ayman al-Zawahiri died like a dog but make sure to thank him for his service on Twitter. Anyway, we are once again chasing Al-Hazmi and Al-Midihar down the road to 9/11 and their incredible run of good luck will continue as only it can. We're also talking drones, Putin's 9/11 warnings, what a real piece of shit John Ashcroft and our psychic war against Richard Blee really starts to kick into gear. All that, plus a lot of powerful people who really wanted to spend Summer 2001 reminding you about Pearl Harbor!

This Sunday, I will report on an alt-right group in Missouri known as Liberty Alliance. This group has released a 'Woke' Map, which targets specific schools and school districts in Missouri, which are believed to be indoctrinating children in 'socialism', 'explicit sexual instruction in terms of the LGBTQ community', as well as 'grooming toddlers for sexual activity.' This 'Woke' Map appears amidst the tragedy of the Ulvade mass murders at Robb Elementary School. This 'Woke' Map is not only the height of irresponsibility; it is an invitation, an incitement to future violence against our schools, but that's not the most shocking detail. This group is run by GOP operatives in Missouri and derives funding from that same GOP. This group's website includes a section for 'Conservative Champions,' which includes the Missouri Attorney General Eric Schmidt, (who is running for Roy Blunt's US Senate seat), and Missouri Secretary of State Jay Ashcroft. Ashcroft is the son of former US Attorney General John Ashcroft, during the George W. Bush administration. You remember--the same John Ashcroft that tolerated legalized TORTURE--in direct violation of the 8th amendment! This doesn't get any more 'mainstream' GOP than the Ashcrofts. Liberty Alliance IS an alt-right group (IMHO), which is actively targeting its political enemies in our SCHOOLS. Come join me as I DOXX this group.  Jeanine  

Welcome to the Instant Trivia podcast episode 271, where we ask the best trivia on the Internet. Round 1. Category: Oman 1: It's the principle natural resource of Oman. oil. 2: Oman waspart of the international force that defeated this country in the 1991 Persian Gulf War. Iraq. 3: A section of Oman, separated from the rest of the country by the UAE, juts into this important strait. the Strait of Hormuz. 4: With no constitution or legislature, Oman is governed by a ruler with this title. the Sultan of Oman. 5: This, the capital city, was formerly paired with Oman in the country's name. Muscat. Round 2. Category: Leading "Roll"S 1: Some people use spray deodorants, but many conservationists prefer this non-aerosol kind. roll-on. 2: When it's time to go to sleep, campers unroll these. a bed roll. 3: If you have lots of dough, you can buy a really nice one of these implements to smooth out your dough. a rolling pin. 4: In the "Beer Barrel Polka", this line precedes "We'll have a barrel of fun". roll out the barrel. 5: Jazz great Morton, or his sweet snack. jelly roll. Round 3. Category: The Contest 1: 1984 Walter Mondale got his 13 electoral votes by winning D.C. and this state. Minnesota. 2: In 1998 Rabbit Hash, Ky. elected Goofy, one of these, as mayor; sadly, the mayor had to be "put down" in 2001. a dog. 3: Peter Ueberroth finished sixth in a 2003 race for this state's highest office, just ahead of Larry Flynt. California. 4: This George W. Bush Cabinet member lost his 2000 Senate race to a man who died a month before the election. John Ashcroft. 5: In 1884 a booster's attack on democratic "Rum, Romanism and Rebellion" backfired on this Down Easter. James Blaine. Round 4. Category: Broadway Debuts 1: In 2009 this "Saturday Night Live" alum made his Broadway debut--not as moi, but as George W. Bush. (Will) Ferrell. 2: Tamyra Gray, who placed 4th in the 1st season of this TV singing contest, later joined the cast of "Bombay Dreams". American Idol. 3: Life is far from crummy for Max Crumm, who won the role of Danny Zuko in the revival on a reality TV show. Grease. 4: Uta Hagen flew onto Broadway in 1938, debuting as Nina in this Chekhov play. The Seagull. 5: Time flies: in 2007 this "Leave It To Beaver" star turned 59 and played Wilbur Turnblad in "Hairspray". Jerry Mathers. Round 5. Category: "C.c." Senor 1: At this Florida site, the scientists are all out to launch. Cape Canaveral. 2: His name, pre-Muhammad Ali. Cassius Clay. 3: Research facilitator that includes the following:. a card catalogue. 4: Ernie Banks played all his Major League games with this team. the Chicago Cubs. 5: In 1968 this labor leader had a grape, er... gripe. Caesar Chavez. Thanks for listening! Come back tomorrow for more exciting trivia!

Other than those who've been elected President, I'm not sure anyone in his generation has had a more remarkable political career than Haley Barbour. Running Mississippi for Nixon while he was still in college...ED of the MS GOP at a critical building phase in the 70s...battling a Senate Giant in his unsuccessful first race in '82...running the Reagan White House's political operation...chairing the RNC during the '94 GOP wave...2-term Governor...and starting what has become one of the most successful lobbying government affairs firms in the country. Great conversation hearing about Haley Barbour's rise from small town Mississippi to the highest corridors of political power. IN THIS EPISODEHow Haley Barbour got into politics “totally by fluke”…Running Mississippi for Nixon in '68…What made a young Haley Barbour gravitate to the Republican Party…The rise of Thad Cochran and Trent Lott…Haley Barbour's time in the early 70s as executive director of the Mississippi Republican Party…The story of Haley Barbour's lone political loss in the 1982 Senate race against longtime Dem incumbent John Stennis…Haley Barbour's rules for candidates and campaign managers…Haley Barbour's time running the political operation in the Reagan White House…Haley Barbour tells his favorite Jim Baker story…The connection between Haley Barbour and serial killer John Wayne Gacy…Why was Barbara Bush so angry at Haley Barbour in the '88 campaign?Why Haley Barbour turned down working out of the White House?The one time Ronald Reagan overruled Haley Barbour?The early days of the rise of Newt Gingrich…Haley Barbour beats two future US Senators to take over the Republican National Committee in 1993…Haley Barbour talks the GOP wave of 1994…Haley Barbour talks his 2003 Governor's campaign ousting a Democratic incumbent…How he overcame the “lobbyist” label in the Governor's race…Getting close to jumping in the 2012 presidential race…How Haley Barbour started one of DC's premier lobbying firms…Haley Barbour rules for being an effective lobbyist…AND…Spencer Abraham, John Ashcroft, Lee Atwater, James Baker, Lloyd Bentsen, Kirk Blalock, Remy Brim, Barbara Bush, Bob Calloway, Gil Carmichael, Jimmy Carter, Bill Clinton Mitch Daniels, Democrats for Eisenhower, Walt Disney, Bob Dole, James Eastland, Frank Fahrenkopf, Don Fierce, Gerald Ford, Kirk Fordice, Jim Free, Lanny Griffith, Mike Huckabee, Paul Johnson, Paul Laxalt, Ron Lewis, Zell Miller, Ronnie Musgrove, Lyn Nofziger, the OEB, Mike Parker, Heather Podesta, Tony Podesta, Scott Reed, Ed Rogers, Ed Rollins, Mitt Romney, George Shultz, Sam Skinner, Stu Spencer, John Sununu, Jim Thompson, George Wallace, Wendell Willkie, and MORE!

John Ashcroft and Dick Foth joins us again today for a special encouragement for Fathers. Dick takes the lead in leading a valuable conversation on the impact of the fathers in our lives.

Oral argument argued before the Eighth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals on or about 04/14/2021

They don't make too many people like Saul Shorr. After hitchhiking across the country,  working in sugar refineries, being in and out of college, Saul fell into working on Mo Udall's 1976 presidential campaign. He soon became an expert in big city politics, started his own media firm, and has helped elect Senators and Governors and Presidents.Saul has one of the most unique paths, some of the biggest wins, and many of the best stories after decades as one of the most respected admakers and strategists in the business. Trust me...if you like politics, you'll love this episode with Saul. Podcast WebsiteTwitter: @ProPoliticsPodTwitter: @ZacMcCraryFacebook: The Pro Politics PodcastIN THIS EPISODE...Robert Moses, of The Power Broker fame, has a lot to do with how Saul grew up in Queens…Saul's memories of the day President Kennedy died…Saul's favorite political slogan of all time…The unusual thing that happened to Saul on his second day working in politics…Saul works for the iconic American political figure Allard Lowenstein…A young Saul spends a day with Coretta Scott King…Saul cuts his teeth in Philly politics during the tumultuous late 70s and early 80s…Saul helps elect Ben Nelson Governor of Nebraska after starting at less than 1%...Saul grows his business by finding a niche with Lieutenant Governors in the South…Saul's paean to life on the road as a political consultant…Saul gives his view from a front row seat of tragedy and triumph of Mel Carnahan…What it was like when Saul joined the historic Obama 2008 team…David Axelrod's memorable when Saul put together test-attack ads against then Senator Obama…Saul's best practices on negative ads…Saul makes arguably the most memorable attack ad against Mitt Romney in 2012…Saul tells the story of how Al Franken's first TV ad “made him Minnesota” and helped propel him to the US Senate…Saul helps Tom Wolf break out of a crowded PA Governor's field…The one criteria Saul (jokingly) gives on bringing on a new client…Saul provides an itinerary for your next trip to Philly... ALSO… Jim Andrews, John Anderson (the Black one), John Anderson (the white one), Andre the Giant, John Ashcroft, Geno Auriemma, David Axelrod, Bob Bedard, Paul Begala, Lucien Blackwell, Sherrod Brown, Jerry Brown, Mary Beth Cahill, Jean Carnahan, Bob Casey, Dick Cheney, Robert Clark, Howard Coffin, Norm Coleman, Tom Corbett, Dick Durbin, Tom Eagleton, Mike Easley, Dwight Evans, Marc Farinella, Chaka Fattah, Diane Feldman, Alan Franken, Ben Franklin, Bill Gray, Pierre Howard, Jay Howser, Jacob Javits, Andi Johnson, Rabbi Meir Kahane, Robert Kennedy, Ed Koch, John Lindsay, Myra MacPherson, Kevin Mack, Adam Magnus, Josh Mandel, Terry McAuliffe, Rob McCord, Katie McGinty, Val Molin, Jim Margolis, George McGovern, James Michener, Molly Murphy, Ricky Nelson, Pall Mall unfilitereds, Elizabeth Pearson, Bev Perdue, David Perdue, David Price, JB Pritzker, Fran Rafferty, Frank Rizzo, Cokie Roberts, Mary Ann Sandretti, Allyson Schwartz, Joe Shafer, The Shorr Holding Company, Chris Sifford, Paul Tully,  Mo Udall, Stewart Udall, Anthony Weiner, Alan Wheat, Dennis Wicker, Roger Wilson, Harriet Woods, Jim Young, and MORE!

Interview with:JOHN ASHCROFT graduated with honors from Yale University in 1964 and received a law degree from the University of Chicago in 1967. He was an associate professor on the business faculty at Southwest Missouri State University in Springfield. He and his wife, Janet, have coauthored two business law textbooks, in addition to authoring numerous professional articles. He was appointed state auditor in 1972, was elected state attorney general in 1976, and was reelected in 1980. He is a former president of the National Association of Attorneys General. He was appointed by the Reagan administration to serve on the U.S. Attorney General’s Task Force on Family Violence in 1983 and in 1986 was appointed to the Advisory Council on Intergovernmental Affairs. He has served as chair of the Education Commission of the States, the Republican Governors Association, and the National Governors Association. Ashcroft was elected governor of Missouri in 1984 and held that office until 1993. He went on to win election to the U.S. Senate where he served from 1995 to 2001. In 2000, he was named U.S. Attorney General by President George W. Bush. He resigned in 2004 and took a teaching position at Regent University.Lieutenant General MICK KICKLIGHTER served in the military for over 35 years. Following his retirement as a Commander of the United States Army Western Command in 1991, he became the Inspector General of the Department of Defense. He also served as the Deputy Under Secretary of the Army for International Affairs, and in 2001, was honored with a nomination by the President to become the Assistant Secretary for Policy and Planning, Department of Veterans Affairs. During his time as a public servant, Mick also served on the Board of Directors for Habitat for Humanity International and held the Chairman position for three years. He currently serves as the Director and Principal Investigator of the Critical Infrastructure Protection Program, a research organization through the George Mason University School of Law.America the Beautiful - Performed by: U.S. Army Brass Quintet

We are joined today by John Ashcroft and Dick Foth who offer their wisdom, experience, and insight in leading in times of crisis and challenge. We have a transparent conversation that is valuable to all.

With Donald Trump moving further into autocracy and his Attorney General dodging demands for his resignation, I could think of no one better to ask on the show than Lisa Graves. She's been a legal advisor to all three branches of government, and served as Deputy Assistant Attorney General under Janet Reno and John Ashcroft. She answers all my questions, and then some!

Best Selling Author, Ken Abraham started as a drummer in “The Watchmen” but after he wrote his first book he knew that there were more books to come in God’s plan for his life. He has written 95+ books for amazing people from Buzz Aldrin to Bill Gaither, Jim Baker to Joel Osteen, John Ashcroft to Joe Gibbs and so many more.Hear how God redeems and doesn’t let any experience go to wasteHis AlongTheWay moments include Drummer in “The Watchmen”Don’t Bite the Apple Until You Check For WormsFinding purpose writing other people’s storiesWrite what you DON’T KNOW… LEARN ABOUT IT!Nothing is wasted, God uses every experience Books Recommended“Loving God” - Chuck CoulsonDavid McCulloughKen’s InfoKen’s WebsiteKen’s Books on AmazonKen’s FacebookAlongTheWay LinksWatch episodes of RealLifeEmail MeMore episodes and Social links for AlongTheWaySupport the show (https://mailchi.mp/4657de6b487f/alongtheway)

After many twists and turns, the 1990-91 Mizzou basketball season ended on the most note positive note possible considering the circumstances. Join me and Blake Stark for a highly entertaining, cathartic, and emotional win in Columbia, as the Tigers send off one of their all-time greats in style. Plus, we discuss Mizzou's Big 8 Tournament Championship at length and all the controversy surrounding it. **** Corrections/Additions: -Mizzou 20-point scorers since Doug Smith: 1. Anthony Peeler, 23.4 in '92. 2. Kareem Rush 21.1 in '01. 3. Paul O'Liney, Thomas Gardner, Jabari Brown and Rush in '02 were all just shy of a full 20 PPG but each would get there if you rounded up. -The game's play-by-play announcer is John Rooney, currently with the St. Louis Cardinals. -Chip Walther's first season was 1993-94, and he graduated in '97. -Notre Dame has made one Final Four appearance (1978). -John Ashcroft was Attorney General under George W. Bush, not Secretary of State. **** Subscribe, rate, and review! And tell a friend, why don't ya? Follow the show everywhere @ForOldMissouri ForOldMissouri.com YouTube.com/ForOldMissouri Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

N8 drops some knowledge of a WAG situation that you might find yourself in one of these days. What do renting a monkey, tacos, John Ashcroft, Alex Jones and the Fondoodler have to do with each other? No idea, but somehow those were the talking points on today's episode. The crew breaks down car stories that weren't their fault but caused a bit of damage. All in all another episode of madness...

Former Missouri Gov. Jay Nixon returns to Politically Speaking to discuss a multitude of issues, including the state of St. Louis’ education system and the challenges of gubernatorial leadership. Nixon served as governor from 2009 to 2017. He is one of only four men (Mel Carnahan, John Ashcroft and Warren Hearnes) to be elected to two consecutive terms as Missouri’s chief executive. He also was elected to four terms as attorney general and to a Jefferson County-based Senate seat.

July 7, 2018 | John Ashcroft, Tony Orlando, Presley Quartet & The Haygoods | Huckabee by Huckabee

The sh*t has hit the fan. This week, we talk about the horrific Parkland school shooting and the fallout, the Mueller Russian indictment story, and we reminisce about Bush era songbird John Ashcroft

Chuck Rosenberg spent most of his career leading or helping lead federal law enforcement agencies. Before serving as head of the Drug Enforcement Administration, Rosenberg served as Jim Comey’s chief of staff at the FBI and the Justice Department, as counselor to FBI director Robert Mueller, and as U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia. Now outside government, Rosenberg shared his thoughts on leadership with a group of University of Virginia law students two weeks ago, and now, we’re sharing his thoughts with you. He says of this speech, “I was privileged to work with great leaders, mentors, and friends at the Department of Justice. I learned so much from them: Bob Mueller, Jim Comey, Sally Yates, John Ashcroft, and David Margolis, among others. I hope my words reflect the values these good people—and so many others at DOJ—consistently demonstrated. Kindness, civility, humility, fairness, and character remain in fashion.”

JANUARY 29, 2018 - It's THE DAILY SHOW WEEKLY, hosted by Vic Shuttee and Chandler Dean! After a month long sabbatical, the Daily Show Weekly is back with the year 2001! With the Bush transition in full swing, we’ve got the controversy of Linda Chavez, the confirmation of John Ashcroft and perhaps most importantly, TEMPTATION ISLAND. Good start to a NEW new millennium.The Daily Show Weekly is an unofficial fan podcast designed to serve as a critical companion to the original series, which can be watched in clips at CC.com. Our thoughts and criticism are intended to offer historical reflection and enhance the viewing experience for new and old fans journeying through Jon Stewart’s seminal talk show run. Our awesome album artwork is designed by Felipe Flores Comics! #Bramp

Childhood friends, Dick Foth and John Ashcroft, reflect on life and liberty.

On today's episode of Loud & Clear, Brian Becker is joined by Jane Cutter, the editor of LiberationNews.org, and by Kevin Zeese, co-director of Popular Resistance.Attorney General Jeff Sessions has testified in a public Senate Intelligence committee hearing. What did he say about Comey, Trump and the investigation into alleged election meddling as the Russia witch hunt continues to roll on? Donald Trump celebrates his 71st birthday day as a political civil war continues to engulf Washington. We take a look at a life marked by extreme bigotry, extreme privilege and dumb luck. Brian is joined by Anoa Changa, the host of the weekly show The Way With Anoa and Deputy Director of MPACT, and by Ben Weaver, Political Director of MPACT The diplomatic crisis among Gulf monarchies continues to develop rapidly. Qatar has hired George W. Bush’s attorney general John Ashcroft as its lawyer and for ‘crisis response’. What’s next in the rift in the Gulf? Massoud Shadjareh, co-founder of the Islamic Human Rights Commission, joins the show.

This week; what is going to implode? The Russian investigation: the government can't operate this way.  Jeff Session a disgrace but someone is going to break. Trump boasting about how much he is getting done. Wrong. Boeing not following through on promises. The killing of Trump/Caesar. And this week the 30th anniversary of fall of the Berlin Wall. Saudi Arabia goes after Qatar. Qatar retains John Ashcroft  law firm. Interesting. A little history and more. Always an interesting perspective on everyday issues.

Beth had seen Dee wearing eyeglasses, Dee’s new diet, Tool, rock band feuds, Vince Neil & Razzle crash, Kid Rock, Mark Mendoza, Bahamas trip prom, selling human poop online, peeps responses to Dee wearing eyeglasses, recap of; Ronald Regan’s post surgery, adult Underoos, super hero’s crotches, men wanting to be born a woman. Peep’s response to Nick’s worst date story, bowel movements, Dee euro stickers, someone stealing the SoBes, peeps respond to bag on Nick & how he was when Dee was on vacation, dolphins, Bush inauguration, girl scout cookies, mad cow and blood donors, Clinton’s skin lesion, Socks the cat & Buddy the dog, couple living on the internet, winner sheets found, wet wipes on a roll, puppetry of the penis, Gene Simmons’s show, extended Friends shows and SNL, Elizabeth Taylor swears off marriage, winner calls in, Dee only wears medium sized shirts, peeps response to selling human poop online, poisoning neighbors pets, one of Dee’s duck’s decapitated, at home with mudbone: hockey, fat man vs the weasel update, Dee’s new diet, fat man vs the weasel competition changes, how people pick and choose what is funny on DSR, the movie Snatch, John Ashcroft, people not concern about tax cuts, heading for recession, school bullies, Super Bowl tickets, country tree vote, peep calls in informing that a Long Island radio show slamming Dee, “Leader of the Pack” cover song, Dee’s bully advise story, birthing twins record, Dee crosses the line with Beth over sex after giving birth, guy arrested over photocopying his butt, Darkside’s photocopying his penis story, cat forced to breath from a bong, Darkside’s stoned cat story, peep calls in with photo copy penis story, Paul Newman, top 10 best actors, Guy Ritchie, Madonna, Zalman repeat letter, response to stars riders and dressing room requests, Say What game, peeps letter about country music/fans, woman president, milk truck rams building, Congo government, erotic fantasies, parent letting a 12 year old have sex, sprinkler to keep drunks away, Wilson castaway volleyball, Jennifer Lopez, D-mail, Darkside’s reading of sponsor, what we learned today, at home with mudbone again. Keyworded by metal kitten.

Beth had seen Dee wearing eyeglasses, Dee’s new diet, Tool, rock band feuds, Vince Neil & Razzle crash, Kid Rock, Mark Mendoza, Bahamas trip prom, selling human poop online, peeps responses to Dee wearing eyeglasses, recap of; Ronald Regan’s post surgery, adult Underoos, super hero’s crotches, men wanting to be born a woman. Peep’s response to Nick’s worst date story, bowel movements, Dee euro stickers, someone stealing the SoBes, peeps respond to bag on Nick & how he was when Dee was on vacation, dolphins, Bush inauguration, girl scout cookies, mad cow and blood donors, Clinton’s skin lesion, Socks the cat & Buddy the dog, couple living on the internet, winner sheets found, wet wipes on a roll, puppetry of the penis, Gene Simmons’s show, extended Friends shows and SNL, Elizabeth Taylor swears off marriage, winner calls in, Dee only wears medium sized shirts, peeps response to selling human poop online, poisoning neighbors pets, one of Dee’s duck’s decapitated, at home with mudbone: hockey, fat man vs the weasel update, Dee’s new diet, fat man vs the weasel competition changes, how people pick and choose what is funny on DSR, the movie Snatch, John Ashcroft, people not concern about tax cuts, heading for recession, school bullies, Super Bowl tickets, country tree vote, peep calls in informing that a Long Island radio show slamming Dee, “Leader of the Pack” cover song, Dee’s bully advise story, birthing twins record, Dee crosses the line with Beth over sex after giving birth, guy arrested over photocopying his butt, Darkside’s photocopying his penis story, cat forced to breath from a bong, Darkside’s stoned cat story, peep calls in with photo copy penis story, Paul Newman, top 10 best actors, Guy Ritchie, Madonna, Zalman repeat letter, response to stars riders and dressing room requests, Say What game, peeps letter about country music/fans, woman president, milk truck rams building, Congo government, erotic fantasies, parent letting a 12 year old have sex, sprinkler to keep drunks away, Wilson castaway volleyball, Jennifer Lopez, D-mail, Darkside’s reading of sponsor, what we learned today, at home with mudbone again. Keyworded by metal kitten.

107 John Ashcroft Vs. Boobs by BeerPlus3

"The 9/11 terrorists were not just lucky once; they were lucky over and over again."—Mindy Kleinberg (9/11 widow) This week we are joined by the Yorkshire-born journalist, educator, photographer and political activist John Booth, whose career in journalism has included working for news organisations in Africa, the US and the UK. John joins us to share something of his intellectual journey into questioning, and then investigating, the events of 9/11, and to discuss his excellent new article recently published by Lobster magazine, "Fifteen Years on from 9/11". John Booth currently writes for Lobster — http://www.lobster-magazine.co.uk — and LAFZ, the magazine for Pakistani diaspora — http://www.lafzmagazine.com — and is a founder member of the Orgreave Truth and Justice Campaign. (For show notes please visit http://themindrenewed.com)

"The 9/11 terrorists were not just lucky once; they were lucky over and over again."—Mindy Kleinberg (9/11 widow) This week we are joined by the Yorkshire-born journalist, educator, photographer and political activist John Booth, whose career in journalism has included working for news organisations in Africa, the US and the UK. John joins us to share something of his intellectual journey into questioning, and then investigating, the events of 9/11, and to discuss his excellent new article recently published by Lobster magazine, "Fifteen Years on from 9/11". John Booth currently writes for Lobster — http://www.lobster-magazine.co.uk — and LAFZ, the magazine for Pakistani diaspora — http://www.lafzmagazine.com — and is a founder member of the Orgreave Truth and Justice Campaign. (For show notes please visit http://themindrenewed.com)

SkyWatchTV took advantage of a campaign stop in our small town by Jay Ashcroft, candidate for Secretary of State in Missouri, to talk with Jay and his father John Ashcroft, a former Missouri governor and US senator who served as Attorney General under President George W. Bush.  They discuss the balance between living as a Christian and compromising to achieve political goals and the challenge of holding fast to one's beliefs in the political arena.

Listen NowShortly before the Supreme Court recesses in early July the Court will rule on David King v. Sylvia Burwell, the case where the plaintiffs argue the Affordable Care Act only allows for tax credit subsidies via state-run exchanges or only those, as the ACA states, "established by the state."  If the court rules in favor of the plaintiff an estimated 5 to 8 million newly insured will lose their coverage absent a subsidy because to date only 16 states plus the District of Columbia have set up state health insurance exchanges or marketplaces.  If this is the Court's ruling how might the Republican-controlled Congress react?   Regardless of the Court's decision the health care reform likely becomes a 2016 presidential campaign issue for the Republican party.  During this 21-minute discussion, Dr. Tevi Troy outlines possible responses by the Republican controlled Congress to a Court's decision in favor of the plaintiffs, how Republican presidential candidates may shape the race's health care reform debate (moreover if the Court rules in favor of Burwell) and he addresses major aspects of the ACA that remain contentious, i.e., the employer mandate, the Cadillac tax and Medicaid reform.Dr. Tevi Troy is currently President of the American Health Policy Institute and Adjunct Fellow at the Hudson Institute.  Previously he served as Deputy Secretary at the Department of Health and Human Services under President George W. Bush, as Deputy Assistant and Acting Assistant to the White House Domestic Policy Council, as Policy Director for Senator John Ashcroft and as Senior Domestic Policy Adviser and Domestic Policy Director for the House Policy Committee.  Still previously he was a Researcher at the American Enterprise Institute.  His numerous writings include,"What Jefferson Read, Eisenhower Watched and Obama Tweeted, 200 Years of Popular Culture in the White House," and "Intellectuals and the American Presidency," Philosophers, Jesters or Technicians?"  Dr. Troy earned his Ph.D. in American Civilizations from the University of Texas as Austin.     Information on Dr. Troy's latest book, ""What Jefferson Read, Eisenhower Watched and Obama Tweeted, 200 Years of Popular Culture in the White House” can be found at: http://www.amazon.com/What-Jefferson-Watched-Obama-Tweeted/dp/1621570398/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1437409023&sr=8-1&keywords=what+jefferson+read+ike+watched+and+obama+tweeted. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.thehealthcarepolicypodcast.com

Are you ready to open the door to more love than you could possibly imagine? Speaker/teacher/spiritual counselor John Ashcroft shares his views on how to let love lead you to a more blissful life! Want to talk to John? Give him a call at 734.326.3433.

"Today, our whole downtown is completely enclosed, and we have a welcome neighbor: A GE nuclear power plant." Show #359, originally performed live 3/22/05, featured 3/8/12 on Radio Boredcast, part of AV Festival 12: As Slow As Possible (International Festival of Art, Technology, Music and Film), curated by Vicki Bennett of People Like Us. Samples include Wendy Carlos, John Ashcroft, Disneyland, Disco Polka, Tony Shalhoub, WarGames, Mogwai, Diane Cluck, and many others, at many speeds. "Looks like tomorrow is already here." MP3's and playlist link: https://lastever.org/ken/extrav/audio/050322.shtml

"Today, our whole downtown is completely enclosed, and we have a welcome neighbor: A GE nuclear power plant." Show #359, originally performed live 3/22/05, featured 3/8/12 on Radio Boredcast, part of AV Festival 12: As Slow As Possible (International Festival of Art, Technology, Music and Film), curated by Vicki Bennett of People Like Us. Samples include Wendy Carlos, John Ashcroft, Disneyland, Disco Polka, Tony Shalhoub, WarGames, Mogwai, Diane Cluck, and many others, at many speeds. "Looks like tomorrow is already here." MP3's and playlist link: http://lastever.org/ken/extrav/audio/050322.shtml

What has been charged thus far is abuse, which I believe, technically, is different from torture. Show #327, originally performed live 8/17/04, added to podcast 9/4/07. MP3's and playlist link: https://lastever.org/ken/extrav/audio/040817.shtml

What has been charged thus far is abuse, which I believe, technically, is different from torture. Show #327, originally performed live 8/17/04, added to podcast 9/4/07. MP3's and playlist link: http://lastever.org/ken/extrav/audio/040817.shtml

John Feffer on North Korea, Melissa Goodman on Patriot Act This week on CounterSpin: There was a big breakthrough in the negotiations on North Korea's nuclear program. Or maybe there wasn't. The press played up a tentative deal that looked all the more so just one day later. So what happened? And whose interests were being served by playing up the apparent progress in negotiations? We'll talk to North Korea expert John Feffer. Also this week: What is it that John Ashcroft doesn't want librarians to tell you about the Patriot Act? That's at the heart of a crucial First Amendment case playing out in Connecticut. We'll hear from the ACLU's Melissa Goodman about the incredible secrecy that continues to surround one of the most important pieces of policy to come out of the so-called "war on terror." The post Counterspin – September 30, 2005 appeared first on KPFA.