Dr Haim had no ulterior motive for blowing the whistle.I fact he risked everything to protect these physically healthy kids with a psych issue( often transient) from harm. He knows HIPPA and his wife is an attorney,He redacted all patient identifying information. to protect the patients’ identities.
Chris Rufo himself has stayed that all pt ID information was redacted. It seems as though the DA who indicted him was misinformed.
Dr Haim and Vanessa Sividge must be protected from criminal liability. This is precisely why whistleblower protections were created.
Did the parents give permission to Haim to access those records? Was Haim involved in their treatment? Accessing the records is a HIPAA violation. Sharing them, redacted or not, is also a violation. Under Texas law, TCH cannot accept new patients and must taper existing patients off treatments they have been receiving. If these kids were existing patients being tapered off treatment, there is no violation of Texas statutes. Why isn't that covered in the story?
Complete agreement on the HIPPA violation. That includes the allegation in the indictment that he gained access to the electronic medical records under false pretense, claiming that he currently had adult patients under his care.
Also, the law had not yet been passed when he violated medical confidentiality.
Should the minutiae of HIPPA trump the protection of children who will be harmed by medical staff caught in delusionary ideologies, or running after Pharma profits?
Do you think that such rules should have protected the Nazi doctors too?
Those are rather loaded questions. We are not just talking about the ¨minutiae of HIPAA.¨ Patient confidentiality is a cornerstone of medical ethics. Everyone has a right to it, including the patients whose records Haim accessed illegally. Haim decided on his own that those patients should have less rights than everyone else, including himself.
At the end of the day, you can approve of what Haim did. But that doesn´t and won´t change the fact that he broke the law and faces legal consequences.
"...those patients should have less rights than everyone else"? Fewer rights, such as....being carved-up by deluded physicians who place ideology and Pharma bucks first?
Those rights, Daniel? Get your priorities straight!
I sense that you are a dirt-disturber here, having joined the conversation as a propagandist. They are all through social media.
Well, to be fair, these are allegations made in the indictment, and until the discovery phase, no one but the prosecutors has access to the evidence. I have stopped using "alleged" in everything I write. So mea culpa on that point.
Of course, it is possible that this aspect of the indictment is entirely baseless. In that case, the prosecutors will be guilty of gross prosecutorial misconduct. That seems highly unlikely to me. The evidence would not depend on witnesses who may be faulty but on hard documentation that would have been presented to the grand jury. And the DOJ has a conviction rate of more than 99%. So theoretically possible, yes. But very, very unlikely.
What is really beyond dispute is that he accessed records for patients not under his care. If they were his patients, then he would have to have been performing the surgeries himself. He would be telling on himself. That´s not the way that Rufo reported it; he claimed that it was the gender clinic, not Haim that was providing the unethical care. And there is no question that if they were not his patients that this is a HIPAA violation.
The defense Rufo is making on his behalf is that the patient information was redacted. But this is a red herring and in fact completely irrelevant to the indictment (which anyone can read for themself). Accessing the information was the HIPAA violation. For Rufo to claim that the redactions are relevant is either willfullly ignorant or blatantly dishonest.
You can choose to doubt the indictment, but Rufo and Haim have their own credibility problems.
I am curious whether you consulted an attorney, or recommend that Dr. Haim consult an attorney before publishing the medical records. Or even read the law yourself. In any case, you both might have realized that the redactions of the patient names would be irrelevant if the records were accessed without proper authorization.
If you had been a bit more curious, you might also have realized that once you published the records, it would be a fairly simple matter for the hospital to follow the electronic trail and determine who had accessed the records. You as much as led the FBI to Dr. Haim’s door.
Perhaps the energy you are spending on being outraged might be better spent on a bit of introspection. It looks as though you were so eager for the scoop that you gave no consideration to the consequences.
You played a critical role in exposing Dr. Haim to prosecution, possibly leading to prison.
Chris Rufo, is there any chance that the DA was lied to by the agents and indicted him unknowingly? Might she quash the indictment ( esp in light of all the damning evidence that is surfacing now about the dangerous transing of minors industry)? Was the DA dipped or complicit?
If Haim’s attorneys are giving an accurate account, then there is no question that she was sloppy. But by the time she presented her case to the grand jury and secured the indictment, she had corrected the putative error.
There is a wide gulf between sloppiness and malicious prosecution. If there is an argument for maliciousness, I am open to it.
Of course the prosecution is deliberate. Claiming that it is malicious is a serious charge, and I don’t see the evidence to support it.
Even if it is malicious, the prosecution was made possible by Dr. Haim accessing the records of patients who were not under his care, which is an unambiguous HIPAA violation, and by your decision to publish them.
So even if you choose to justify Dr. Haim’s actions and your own, let’s be clear about the facts.
The facts are that a medical whistleblower has to access the charts in order to have proof! This is why the whistleblower protections were enacted.otherwise one could only blow the whistle on himself! He redacted all pt identifying information.
If a dr accesses records that are not of his pts for reasons other than whistleblowing then it’s not protected.
You say that you haven’t seen evidence, why would you be privy to evidence other than what Chris Rufo, Dr Haim or the prosecution puts out in the public domain.
This is so blatantly a malicious prosecution since the only ppl doing crimes were hosp administrators and GAC drs. The WOKE DOJ is punishing Dr Haim for coming forward and silencing others who were contemplating coming forward.
HIPAA does not include a provision that permits accessing the records of patients not under the providers care, for the purpose of whistleblowing. It also specifies only two avenues for whistleblowing: a healthcare regulatory agency, or a lawyer advising the intended whistleblower. Leaking to a journalist is not included.
The argument you are making is simply not supported by the law. WIshing does not make it so. Dr. Haim would have been well advised to seek legal counsel, before he accessed confidential medical records, under false pretense.
You may choose to support Dr. Haim´s actions. But regardless of the imputed motivations of the prosecutor, his own actions exposed him to the legal consequences he now faces.
The question of whether identifying information was redacted is irrelevant to the indictment. If he knows HIPAA, then he knows that he committed a violation the moment he accessed medical records for patients not under his care.
Also, he is not a whistleblower, which would mean that he reported his concerns to an appropriate government agency.
I can assure you that accessing patient medical records unless the patient is under your care, or you have a legitimate business reason, does not just go against a BS paperwork rule. It is absolutely essential for maintaining medical confidentiality, and it is taken very seriously.
You can support what Haim did. You cannot claim that it was not unethical or illegal.
I absolutely can claim "that it was not unethical" as ethics are subjective and arguable.
Law is law.illegal is illegal. I will grant you that.
However, as Madeleine Rowley point out in her article, laws are quite often inconsistently reinforced. I am sure there are plenty of friends of the Left that having been caught violating HIPAA laws, and are not facing the possibility of10 years in prison.
Patient confidentiality is a cornerstone of medical ethics. If it were so subjective that it could be dismissed with whatever justification one might invent, it would be rendered meaningless. And the ethical importance of patient confidentiality is why it has been encoded into law.
Everyone, yourself included, has a right to expect confidentiality. Dr. Haim had no right to determine that the gender clinic patients had less rights than the rest of us.
Rowley’s article gave examples of cases that she had prosecuted, but no examples of HIPPA violations that she had not. If she, or Dr. Haim’s lawyers can present a cogent argument, backed by evidence, for selective prosecution, I would consider it. Until then, claims of selective prosecution are sheer speculation and carry no legal weight whatsoever.
How exactly would this situation have been discovered had it not been for Mr. Haim exposing alleged treatments after they were made illegal? Is the hospital yet under investigation?
We are in agreement on that point. I worked in a major hospital and I was trained on the electronic medical record and HIPAA. That’s part of the reason why I take medical confidentiality so seriously.
We don't have the facts to make that judgement. If these kids were already being treated, and were being tapered, as per Texas law, then there was no violation.
There is nothing to say but we live in a fascist country that is only just starting its descent. A vote for Joe Biden is a vote for fascism. This is merely one example of it.
We live in a Fascist country that doesn't quite have it right yet. What was said of Mussolini was that he got the trains to run on time. There is no one that competent in the Biden Administration.
It’s also a vote against the US Constitution since everyone knows Biden has a progressive dementia of some type. The POTUS is constitutionally an elected CEO who is responsible for all decisions in his administration.nit is obvious to the Country that for the first time the office is being run by an unelected cabal of ministers.
I think it is run by the cabinet, but there's nothing to do about it and without a whistleblower we can't even prove it. The 25th Amendment requires the VP and cabinet to find him unable to do his job and they like it as it is. It comes down to the vote and they are cheating already, openly, with complete disdain for Americans citizens.
Everyone knows it . Mr Hurr. Put it in writing, and James Lindsay has a Dem who works in the WH admitting it on camera. Dean Phillips who ran for the Dem nomination said it in an interview as did others in the Dem party.
The citizenry knows it and therefore the only American choices are RFK jr, DJTrump, or sit this one out
Madeleine is a star. Thank you for speaking up for Paulette Harlow. DOJ and FBI are Biden’s Gestapo, going after anyone who tries to protect children and fulfill their Hippocratic oaths. I hope more doctors will take a stand for Dr. Haim, but from first hand experience I have seen too many of them remain silent or acquiescent to the regime out of cowardice.
TCH and the cabal of doctors maiming and torturing the children are the criminals. The US Attorney, i in effect acting as a mob attorney for the TCH cabal. Both should be strongly investigated and held to account.
There is so much evidence coming out from the unsealed documents in the Alabama case that WPATH and AAPediatrics were lyong that they had data to support transing minors. R Levine Asst Sec Of HHS ( trans person) pressured WPATH to remove any age requirement for kids in their SOC8 recommendations. This was done at the last minute before SOC8 was published and without the consent it even knowledge of the drs on that panel that wrote the SOC8.
There is more than enough information to show that the entire WOAtH is a group of trans cult activists that sacrificed heathy kids sterility and g
Health on the altar of their trans ideology. They permanently harm kids, destroying families and society.
What Dr Eithan Haim took tremendous courage and at great risk to his nascent career , family and freedom he blew the whistle.He must be protected
I believe the whistleblowers fully. There was a time when I criticized the less-than-expert knowledge base and the literature written by a doctor meant to be a rising star at a large research hospital. Soon after, in the middle of the night, I received a phone call (with no name) from someone who said they were a hospital attorney, and a threat that I should keep my mouth shut. A reminder to me, too, that they had almost unlimited resources to throw at this, while I had little in comparison.
Outrageous is an inadequate term for this. Even after all the other examples of unequal justice, this case really shocked me…as did the demonstration case. With daily reminders that persons with “acceptable “ political positions can act with impunity whereas even a “trigger” can result in severe punishment, no wonder many have lost faith in not only the legal system but many other institutions that are supposed to act for the welfare of the American people in general…not some “elite” few.
I cannot help but notice that both Haim´s attorney and you have been evasive about whether Haim enjoys whistleblower protections. My reading of the law makes it pretty clear that he doesn´t. So I am presuming that his attorneys are going to advance a novel legal theory that goes beyond the letter of the law.
Meanwhile, so many of his supporters think it´s more clear cut than that. Seems a bit deceptive to me. And in general, this article is not really forthcoming about all the facts of this case (as I have argued extensively in other comments). I share your views about trans health care, but your approach to this doesn´t sit right with me.
I am keenly interested in this question, not only with regard to frequency but the severity of the violation.
It’s not uncommon for health care workers to access charts without justification, and I suspect that relatively few of those are prosecuted.
In this case, DOJ alleges that Haim falsely claimed that he was currently caring for adult patients as a justification for renewing his credential and gaining access to the system. That raises his violation to a felony. How many of those are prosecuted? My sense is that it is harder to justify not charging the violation when it’s done under false pretenses. There is a willfulness to the violation that precludes claiming that the violation was inadvertent or done in ignorance of the law. I suspect it’s charged more often but I don’t know.
DOJ is also claiming malicious harm, which raises the maximum prison sentence from five years to ten. This strikes me, however, as the weakest element of the indictment. It would be good to know how frequently that is charged and under what circumstances.
Unless we have the answers to these questions, I don’t see how it can be claimed that it’s a selective or political prosecution. It’s something that Haim’s legal team may want to address, but my understanding is that it is generally a hard thing to prove.
Again, it is an excellent question, but we don’t have the answer.
There are protections for whistleblowers, which means you report your concerns to an appropriate government agency. There is no protection for accessing confidential medical records and leaking them to a journalist.
Since you claim to know the law, what is the culpability of Texas Children’s Hospital's (TCH) continued "Gender Affirming Care" (which is in and of itself an oxymoron), after they told WAPO that they had discontinued the practice. Also, what is your definition of "an appropriate government agency"?
I am not disputing what you say about CPS. I am just making the point that he does not qualify for whistleblower status.
I would repeat my point that at the time he leaked the confidential medical records the procedures were not illegal. Immoral, yes. Complete agreement on that point.
You can take the position that what he did merited risking prosecution. But you cannot claim that his actions did not violate medical ethics or that they were not illegal.
You are correct, I imagine, about the legality of what Dr. Haim did.
But in a broader context, what he did was done in good conscience to expose and right what he perceived as a wrong being done to children, and I'd think that the care-taking concern of a physician would/should supersede mere concerns about documents leaked without identifying information on them. Were the children harmed by Dr. Haim's actions? I doubt it. Would TCH be harmed? Yes, and that's the point of the leak, as it exposes practices which we're now beginning to understand aren't based so much on evidence-based medicine or even genuine care for children (how in hell in a 12-year-old able to distinguish gender dysphoria from growing-up dysphoria?) but on blind ideology and a desire for the expansion of technology into our lives and the profit off that.
I speak as one whose daughter is even now captured within that sick system, against my will, and no, I can't even access records about what they're doing to her because of those same HIPAA regulations. The state, through the medical system, now effectively owns my child with regard to these treatments: Hitler would love it ("children are the property of the state.")
And ... exactly what "medical ethics" are we talking about?
Medical confidentiality is a cornerstone of medical ethics. The moment that Dr. Haim accessed those records, he violated medical confidentiality and committed a HIPAA violation. Everyone has a right to that confidentiality, and Dr. Haim decided that the patients of the gender clinic had less rights than he did.
You may take the position that Dr. Haim was justified in his actions in pursuit of a higher good. I happen to disagree. But either way, that doesn´t change the fact he now faces legal consequences that are the direct result of those actions.
I'd argue that informed consent and bodily autonomy are cornerstones of medical ethics, and that medical confidentiality is meaningless when we're asked if we've had a certain vaccine, and if we can't prove that, then we might lose our jobs or be denied access to a venue. And if a parent can't access his child's medical records because of HIPAA-- wait a minute, that's a bit insane. I just want to know regarding my own daughter (13 years old) and I believe I have a right to that, and the state has no right to withhold that information.
Yes, I'd argue that Dr. Haim was pursuing a higher good, but I'd also argue that he did violate HIPAA statues and in fairness should receive some sanction. But to pretend that his punishment should be severe only serves the established corrupt order of things, when on the other hand our HIPAA rights had been violated in spades during Covid and there were, overall, no sanctions at all for that.
If you go to an appropriate government agency, you have whistleblower protection. Yes, there is still a risk. But you are not very likely to be prosecuted, and you have legal recourse for any retaliation.
If, on the other hand, you violate HIPAA by entering an electronic medical record and leaking confidential records to a journalist, you are creating a clear trail of evidence that definitely exposes you to prosecution. Haim and Rufo both knew this, or could have easily known this. Haim could have and should have sought legal advice before proceeding in this manner, and Rufo should have insisted that he do so before publishing illegally obtained medical records.
Instead Rufo is making a false and quite frankly ridiculous claim that the redaction of the names precludes a HIPAA violation. This is willful ignorance. All you have to do is read the statute.
The law does not provide whistleblower protection for what Haim did. In fact, neither Rufo nor Haim´s lawyers are claiming that Haim has legal whistleblower protection. Rufo is only saying that it´s a matter to be litigated, which I take to mean that Haim´s lawyers are devising a novel legal theory that goes beyond the letter of the law. I am no lawyer, but that sounds like a longshot. I would not want to bet my freedom on it.
Haim and Rufo were extremely reckless. Claiming that this is a political prosecution does not change these facts. Haim is the one that is likely to pay the price. Rufo is not.
The choices being made about who and what topics to prosecute vs ignore or refuse to charge is the political prosecution in my view. Obviously, the federal government going after him betrays the fact that he couldn't very well go to the government in good faith. I wasn't being facetious when asking, and I appreciate your response.
TCH said they were going to stop the procedures before they become illegal. As far as I know there are no legal consequences for having made a false public statement. As to the situation now, I have no knowledge.
According to the indictment, Haim received training that he should report his concerns to CPS. The other possibility would be a health care regulatory agency.
Daniel, I have some familiarity with CPS as we were foster parents for a number of years. I can assure you that while Child Protective Services may be legally the proper place for such complaints, they would fall on deaf ears. So what is a doctor supposed to do when the very legal agencies to which he should report illegal mutilation of children are doing nothing to stop it and are, in many states, actually facilitating it?
I can't blame Haim at all for not taking that road. He would face the same charges, but without the larger megaphone that Mr. Rufo has provided for him.
Oxford describes a whistleblower as “a person who informs on a person or organization engaged in an illicit activity.” There is no mention of “government agency”. Clearly the Hospital knew these practices were continuing in violation of state law, and that services were being billed illegally. As the author says nearby, this will be litigated. Was Snowden a whistleblower? Was Daniel Ellsberg? If the definition of whistleblower becomes too precise, it will effectively kill one of our most effective means of uncovering criminal wrongdoing.
At the time that Haim accessed the confidential medical records, the practices had not yet been made illegal. So even this dictionary definition does not apply.
Even then, dictionary definitions are beside the point I am making. The law does not depend on common, dictionary definitions, but on statutes. The question is whether Dr. Haim had a legal whistleblower status that mitigates his violation of HIPAA.
HIPAA allows for redacted medical records to be revealed either to a healthcare agency, or to a lawyer that is advising the would-be whistleblower. They do not allow for them to be leaked to a journalist. So this provision does not apply to Haim’s conduct.
And there is nothing in HIPPA that permits an unauthorized individual to access the records of a patient that is not under his care. His intention about what to do with that information is irrelevant. He has committed a HIPPA violation the moment he accesses the record.
Moreover, Haim was not revealing illegal practices; he was revealing that the hospital had made a false statement that the hospital had made claiming that they had discontinued the controversial (but not yet illegal) practices.
If you want to stretch the broad, common definition of whistleblower to cover exposing a false statement by a hospital, well fine. But stretching that definition doesn’t mitigate Haim’s legal exposure, or alter the fact that it is unethical to violate medical confidentiality.
Rufo claims that the question of whistleblower status will be litigated. Perhaps it will, according to a novel legal argument that it has not yet been revealed. If and when it is, the court will have an opportunity, and so will I, to consider the argument.
If I find it persuasive, I may change my mind. Until then, I stand by what I have written.
Yes, and in a broader context freedom of speech-- to speak up and expose perceived wrongdoings-- has traditionally been seen as as effective measure to root out "bad ministers" and government corruption. So we might ask if all this lawfare isn't maneuvering to cover up corporate corruption (of course it is!) in the alliance with what now appears to be the corporate handmaiden: our government that's supposed to protect and preserve our autonomy and freedom of speech, not to mention abuses of our children.
I realize you are correct about protections, but I assume you would agree that had he reported his findings to a government agency, it would be years before anyone would notice, read, respond, investigate, etc. In the story of the dumpster-fire Generic drug company Ranbaxy, it took FDA at least 2 years before they even acknowledged the multitude of emails sent by the whistleblower and then multiple more years to complete their investigation. The system is so badly messed up, I can understand why he did what he did. These are human beings that were being harmed.
I agree that reporting to a government agency would probably have been pointless. My only point was that he cannot legally claim whistleblower protection for leaking to a journalist.
I don´t have any trouble understanding why he did what he did, or why so many consider him a hero. But I still think his actions were unethical and ill-advised. And regardless, as a result of his own actions, he now faces serioius legal consequences.
More than anything, I want to make clear the facts of the matter.
If I had been advising him, I would have suggested that he take his concerns to sympathetic state legislators, in particular the prime movers behind the law that passed after Rufo´s article appeared. They would have had the power to investigate, without compromising patient confidentiality.
Givesendgo, an actual legitimate site, has a donation bucket for "Legal Defense Fund for Surgeon Whistleblower" that goes to this effort. I have donated as have many others.
Suppression of dissent under bogus charges is all the WOKE/Neo-Marxist fashion these days, don't you know.
For instance, I see that British freedom-fighter Tommy Robinson was arrested yesterday on his speaking tour in Canada. Supposedly for "immigration irregularities". Uh-huh... Took ten officers, apparently, to do the job. Though Tommy did not resist. He is under orders after release not to leave the city of Calgary, which means he cannot continue on his speaking tour.
Oh....so that's what the arrest was all about!
See Rebel News Canada.
In the meantime, Canada has had vast numbers of illegal immigrants flooding over the border between U.S. and Canada at the Roxham Road crossing, and not only were they not stopped or arrested for "immigration irregularities" -- but the RCMP carried their bags for them and arranged taxpayer-covered motels.
By March 2023—when Roxham Road was closed for good—a total of 95,610 irregular asylum seekers had used it to cross into the country.
Anyone with half a brain can see what is going on here.
Obama also pushed the concept of "unconscious bias" and supposedly being trained out of it. A great new industry for his pals. All fabricated nonsense. In terms of Psychology and Neuroscience, there is no such thing. But it sounds expert and official, doesn't it?
Imagine one looks at a society from a historical basis - and mutilating teens is both allowed and done by older experts. And then if someone complains she is, literally, prosecuted. Barbaric, no?
The FBI and DOJ cannot be reformed. Both government institutions are rotten from the core to the outer skin. I'm sure there is an occasional good faith employee, but they obviously have no power. All that's left to do with both institutions, is abolish them and return their investigations and prosecutions to the states. They've been corrupted and once corruption takes hold, there's no going back. #AbolishTheFBIAndDOJ
My father was a career DOJ attorney. I asked him in late 2017 what happened to the employer from which he retired. He replied that they had brought in attorneys who believed that the law was a club that they could use to impose their agenda and not something that they had to follow.
If you go to the Marco Polo site and open their searchable collection of 125 thousand of Hunter's emails one of the frequent cast members is Louie Freeh former FBI director and former Federal Judge. Freeh is doing a lot of the inside work for Burisma - Meeting with senior State and DOJ officials including his old FBI pals. He had arranged for the head of Burisma to meet with one of the top FBI officials.
With the laptop in the hands of the FBI but still hidden Freeh suddenly changed careers and joined a very large international "consultant" firm with a note in the press release that he would no longer practice law . Most likely he thought there was a good chance that he would be prosecuted for work as part of Team Hunter.
Leslie, this just is not possible. The FBI and DOJ are the enforcement mechanism for federal laws. Without them, how would you enforce the laws against counterfeiting or interstate kidnapping? Yes, they need a huge housecleaning, but so does every other institution in America. That's what happens when you spend 40 years educating your elites to believe postmodernist drivel and hate their own culture and heritage. That's what needs to be fixed. Whether it can be (before it destroys us), I'm not sure.
One of my favorite Jordan Peterson quotes: "If you keep slicing people into ever smaller and smaller groups, you find that each person's combination of oppressions is unique. Intersectionally, everyone is in a group of 1, a unique individual. The logical endpoint of intersectionality is individuality. The intersectionalists will get there, if they don't kill us all first."
Untrue. The DOJ and FBI are fairly new inventions of the Federal government. The states handled these issues before and can certainly do so again. The FBI wasn't a thing until last century and the DOJ isn't much older. Don't let the Feds convince you we need them. We don't.
Fairly new? Both are over 100 years old. Yes, states apprehended and prosecuted federal crimes... prior to the Civil War. We don't live in that world anymore. America bears no resemblance to that world legally, socially, or geographically. The idea that 2024 America can somehow do without any federal law enforcement agency is about as realistic as the libertarian fever dreams of doin away with occupational licensing or going back to the gold standard.
Which means we did without them for roughly 150 years. As for your argument "America bears no resemblance" to that world, you're wrong. People haven't changed. Only technology has. Tax dollars can be used to fund investigations in the states instead of the black hole of federal law enforcement. All we get from them right now is abuse of the justice system and partisan political investigations. Why in God's name would we *keep* funding them at this point? Feel free to enjoy prison as a "domestic terrorist" under this DOJ, but I can do without them and absolutely believe we should. There's more than two ways to skin a cat and we need a new way to provide oversight of your injustice system. Abolishing this cesspool is a good first step. Plus, I don't see you dropping any solutions to these problems. If you've got a better idea then continuing to fund the administrative and politically beholden state, I'm all ears.
People are the same, but their behavior is not. Federal law enforcement sprang out of 2 needs: 1) the post-war civil rights amendments being enforced in the South; 2) increasingly easy interstate travel.
Contra what the Democrats would like people to believe, the first of these has largely abated. However, the second has risen astronomically. In 1865, the majority of Americans still died in their birth state and many in the same county.
I agree that there needs to be additional oversight of DOJ and a major housecleaning. But I just can't see how a society as mobile as ours can function without some type of federal law enforcement.
Honestly, that's just a lack of imagination. I worked in the legal field for nearly 3 decades. With a few new rules regarding interstate crime, it could easily be managed. Regardless, there's no other way to rein in the corruption and weaponization currently dogging the nation's justice system. Once that bridge has been crossed, it falls into the ravine below. We warned the Democrats against opening that door and instead of heeding us, they merrily traipsed through it. We're on an uncharted side of the Rubicon. It's time to burn it to the ground and start over or we're going to see both sides going tit for tat and a whole lot of innocent people are going to pay the price. A few growing pains is worth it if it means we get back to neutrality.
"Police in Birmingham, England, have cited a woman for praying silently near an abortion clinic for a third time, even though Britain’s top legal officer has said such actions are legal."
It seems to be a new Neo-Marxist tactic -- harassing and even arresting non-threatening persons praying near abortion clinics. Another turn-the-world-upside-down tactic. While BLM and Pro-Hamas destructos taking over the public sphere is applauded.
Dr Haim had no ulterior motive for blowing the whistle.I fact he risked everything to protect these physically healthy kids with a psych issue( often transient) from harm. He knows HIPPA and his wife is an attorney,He redacted all patient identifying information. to protect the patients’ identities.
Chris Rufo himself has stayed that all pt ID information was redacted. It seems as though the DA who indicted him was misinformed.
Dr Haim and Vanessa Sividge must be protected from criminal liability. This is precisely why whistleblower protections were created.
Correct!
Did the parents give permission to Haim to access those records? Was Haim involved in their treatment? Accessing the records is a HIPAA violation. Sharing them, redacted or not, is also a violation. Under Texas law, TCH cannot accept new patients and must taper existing patients off treatments they have been receiving. If these kids were existing patients being tapered off treatment, there is no violation of Texas statutes. Why isn't that covered in the story?
Lot of assumptions there.
Texas law is very clear. No assumptions needed.
Texas Law maybe, You OTOH.
Complete agreement on the HIPPA violation. That includes the allegation in the indictment that he gained access to the electronic medical records under false pretense, claiming that he currently had adult patients under his care.
Also, the law had not yet been passed when he violated medical confidentiality.
Let’s have all the facts.
Should the minutiae of HIPPA trump the protection of children who will be harmed by medical staff caught in delusionary ideologies, or running after Pharma profits?
Do you think that such rules should have protected the Nazi doctors too?
Those are rather loaded questions. We are not just talking about the ¨minutiae of HIPAA.¨ Patient confidentiality is a cornerstone of medical ethics. Everyone has a right to it, including the patients whose records Haim accessed illegally. Haim decided on his own that those patients should have less rights than everyone else, including himself.
At the end of the day, you can approve of what Haim did. But that doesn´t and won´t change the fact that he broke the law and faces legal consequences.
"...those patients should have less rights than everyone else"? Fewer rights, such as....being carved-up by deluded physicians who place ideology and Pharma bucks first?
Those rights, Daniel? Get your priorities straight!
I sense that you are a dirt-disturber here, having joined the conversation as a propagandist. They are all through social media.
How do you know for a fact that he did not have adult patients under his care?
Well, to be fair, these are allegations made in the indictment, and until the discovery phase, no one but the prosecutors has access to the evidence. I have stopped using "alleged" in everything I write. So mea culpa on that point.
Of course, it is possible that this aspect of the indictment is entirely baseless. In that case, the prosecutors will be guilty of gross prosecutorial misconduct. That seems highly unlikely to me. The evidence would not depend on witnesses who may be faulty but on hard documentation that would have been presented to the grand jury. And the DOJ has a conviction rate of more than 99%. So theoretically possible, yes. But very, very unlikely.
What is really beyond dispute is that he accessed records for patients not under his care. If they were his patients, then he would have to have been performing the surgeries himself. He would be telling on himself. That´s not the way that Rufo reported it; he claimed that it was the gender clinic, not Haim that was providing the unethical care. And there is no question that if they were not his patients that this is a HIPAA violation.
The defense Rufo is making on his behalf is that the patient information was redacted. But this is a red herring and in fact completely irrelevant to the indictment (which anyone can read for themself). Accessing the information was the HIPAA violation. For Rufo to claim that the redactions are relevant is either willfullly ignorant or blatantly dishonest.
You can choose to doubt the indictment, but Rufo and Haim have their own credibility problems.
I am curious whether you consulted an attorney, or recommend that Dr. Haim consult an attorney before publishing the medical records. Or even read the law yourself. In any case, you both might have realized that the redactions of the patient names would be irrelevant if the records were accessed without proper authorization.
If you had been a bit more curious, you might also have realized that once you published the records, it would be a fairly simple matter for the hospital to follow the electronic trail and determine who had accessed the records. You as much as led the FBI to Dr. Haim’s door.
Perhaps the energy you are spending on being outraged might be better spent on a bit of introspection. It looks as though you were so eager for the scoop that you gave no consideration to the consequences.
You played a critical role in exposing Dr. Haim to prosecution, possibly leading to prison.
It’s not a good look for a journalist.
Chris Rufo, is there any chance that the DA was lied to by the agents and indicted him unknowingly? Might she quash the indictment ( esp in light of all the damning evidence that is surfacing now about the dangerous transing of minors industry)? Was the DA dipped or complicit?
No, she is complicit. She is prosecuting him deliberately and maliciously.
Damn,
I would have thought she would have reviewed the evidence carefully on a case this sensitive with this much national exposure.
People in power often blind themselves to the significance of their bad acts.
If Haim’s attorneys are giving an accurate account, then there is no question that she was sloppy. But by the time she presented her case to the grand jury and secured the indictment, she had corrected the putative error.
There is a wide gulf between sloppiness and malicious prosecution. If there is an argument for maliciousness, I am open to it.
Of course the prosecution is deliberate. Claiming that it is malicious is a serious charge, and I don’t see the evidence to support it.
Even if it is malicious, the prosecution was made possible by Dr. Haim accessing the records of patients who were not under his care, which is an unambiguous HIPAA violation, and by your decision to publish them.
So even if you choose to justify Dr. Haim’s actions and your own, let’s be clear about the facts.
The facts are that a medical whistleblower has to access the charts in order to have proof! This is why the whistleblower protections were enacted.otherwise one could only blow the whistle on himself! He redacted all pt identifying information.
If a dr accesses records that are not of his pts for reasons other than whistleblowing then it’s not protected.
You say that you haven’t seen evidence, why would you be privy to evidence other than what Chris Rufo, Dr Haim or the prosecution puts out in the public domain.
This is so blatantly a malicious prosecution since the only ppl doing crimes were hosp administrators and GAC drs. The WOKE DOJ is punishing Dr Haim for coming forward and silencing others who were contemplating coming forward.
HIPAA does not include a provision that permits accessing the records of patients not under the providers care, for the purpose of whistleblowing. It also specifies only two avenues for whistleblowing: a healthcare regulatory agency, or a lawyer advising the intended whistleblower. Leaking to a journalist is not included.
The argument you are making is simply not supported by the law. WIshing does not make it so. Dr. Haim would have been well advised to seek legal counsel, before he accessed confidential medical records, under false pretense.
You may choose to support Dr. Haim´s actions. But regardless of the imputed motivations of the prosecutor, his own actions exposed him to the legal consequences he now faces.
Thank you for responding. I would like to know more about your story. May I DM you?
Why doesn't the State of Texas come to their defenses?
It is happening both at th3 state and federal level.
The question of whether identifying information was redacted is irrelevant to the indictment. If he knows HIPAA, then he knows that he committed a violation the moment he accessed medical records for patients not under his care.
Also, he is not a whistleblower, which would mean that he reported his concerns to an appropriate government agency.
"appropriate government agency" ROFLMAO
Specifically, according to the indictment to CPS, or to a healthcare regulatory agency. He’s not a whistleblower.
Remember vaccine passports, whe random doofuses got into everyone's medical records?
I can assure you that accessing patient medical records unless the patient is under your care, or you have a legitimate business reason, does not just go against a BS paperwork rule. It is absolutely essential for maintaining medical confidentiality, and it is taken very seriously.
You can support what Haim did. You cannot claim that it was not unethical or illegal.
Let’s just be clear about the facts.
I absolutely can claim "that it was not unethical" as ethics are subjective and arguable.
Law is law.illegal is illegal. I will grant you that.
However, as Madeleine Rowley point out in her article, laws are quite often inconsistently reinforced. I am sure there are plenty of friends of the Left that having been caught violating HIPAA laws, and are not facing the possibility of10 years in prison.
Patient confidentiality is a cornerstone of medical ethics. If it were so subjective that it could be dismissed with whatever justification one might invent, it would be rendered meaningless. And the ethical importance of patient confidentiality is why it has been encoded into law.
Everyone, yourself included, has a right to expect confidentiality. Dr. Haim had no right to determine that the gender clinic patients had less rights than the rest of us.
Rowley’s article gave examples of cases that she had prosecuted, but no examples of HIPPA violations that she had not. If she, or Dr. Haim’s lawyers can present a cogent argument, backed by evidence, for selective prosecution, I would consider it. Until then, claims of selective prosecution are sheer speculation and carry no legal weight whatsoever.
I have been a healthcare provider for 30 years.
Thanks for the lecture.
How exactly would this situation have been discovered had it not been for Mr. Haim exposing alleged treatments after they were made illegal? Is the hospital yet under investigation?
We are in agreement on that point. I worked in a major hospital and I was trained on the electronic medical record and HIPAA. That’s part of the reason why I take medical confidentiality so seriously.
Except this TCH stuff is physical harm vs. BS paperwork rules.
We don't have the facts to make that judgement. If these kids were already being treated, and were being tapered, as per Texas law, then there was no violation.
By "tapering", you probably mean a 0.000001 % annual reduction in dosage per unit body mass.
He most certainly is a whistleblower.
Per what law does leaking confidential medical records to a journalist qualify you for whistleblower protection?
There is nothing to say but we live in a fascist country that is only just starting its descent. A vote for Joe Biden is a vote for fascism. This is merely one example of it.
We live in a Fascist country that doesn't quite have it right yet. What was said of Mussolini was that he got the trains to run on time. There is no one that competent in the Biden Administration.
Apparently not.
It’s also a vote against the US Constitution since everyone knows Biden has a progressive dementia of some type. The POTUS is constitutionally an elected CEO who is responsible for all decisions in his administration.nit is obvious to the Country that for the first time the office is being run by an unelected cabal of ministers.
I think it is run by the cabinet, but there's nothing to do about it and without a whistleblower we can't even prove it. The 25th Amendment requires the VP and cabinet to find him unable to do his job and they like it as it is. It comes down to the vote and they are cheating already, openly, with complete disdain for Americans citizens.
Everyone knows it . Mr Hurr. Put it in writing, and James Lindsay has a Dem who works in the WH admitting it on camera. Dean Phillips who ran for the Dem nomination said it in an interview as did others in the Dem party.
The citizenry knows it and therefore the only American choices are RFK jr, DJTrump, or sit this one out
Did you smack your head?
Madeleine is a star. Thank you for speaking up for Paulette Harlow. DOJ and FBI are Biden’s Gestapo, going after anyone who tries to protect children and fulfill their Hippocratic oaths. I hope more doctors will take a stand for Dr. Haim, but from first hand experience I have seen too many of them remain silent or acquiescent to the regime out of cowardice.
TCH and the cabal of doctors maiming and torturing the children are the criminals. The US Attorney, i in effect acting as a mob attorney for the TCH cabal. Both should be strongly investigated and held to account.
Agreed.
There is so much evidence coming out from the unsealed documents in the Alabama case that WPATH and AAPediatrics were lyong that they had data to support transing minors. R Levine Asst Sec Of HHS ( trans person) pressured WPATH to remove any age requirement for kids in their SOC8 recommendations. This was done at the last minute before SOC8 was published and without the consent it even knowledge of the drs on that panel that wrote the SOC8.
There is more than enough information to show that the entire WOAtH is a group of trans cult activists that sacrificed heathy kids sterility and g
Health on the altar of their trans ideology. They permanently harm kids, destroying families and society.
What Dr Eithan Haim took tremendous courage and at great risk to his nascent career , family and freedom he blew the whistle.He must be protected
I believe the whistleblowers fully. There was a time when I criticized the less-than-expert knowledge base and the literature written by a doctor meant to be a rising star at a large research hospital. Soon after, in the middle of the night, I received a phone call (with no name) from someone who said they were a hospital attorney, and a threat that I should keep my mouth shut. A reminder to me, too, that they had almost unlimited resources to throw at this, while I had little in comparison.
That is some story! How long ago did that happen.
About 15 years ago.
Outrageous is an inadequate term for this. Even after all the other examples of unequal justice, this case really shocked me…as did the demonstration case. With daily reminders that persons with “acceptable “ political positions can act with impunity whereas even a “trigger” can result in severe punishment, no wonder many have lost faith in not only the legal system but many other institutions that are supposed to act for the welfare of the American people in general…not some “elite” few.
Thanks.
Why did I think there was some protection for “ whistleblowers?”
Aren’t they a protected class, or only when they further the agenda?
It's a complex legal question. Will be litigated.
I cannot help but notice that both Haim´s attorney and you have been evasive about whether Haim enjoys whistleblower protections. My reading of the law makes it pretty clear that he doesn´t. So I am presuming that his attorneys are going to advance a novel legal theory that goes beyond the letter of the law.
Meanwhile, so many of his supporters think it´s more clear cut than that. Seems a bit deceptive to me. And in general, this article is not really forthcoming about all the facts of this case (as I have argued extensively in other comments). I share your views about trans health care, but your approach to this doesn´t sit right with me.
I am keenly interested in this question, not only with regard to frequency but the severity of the violation.
It’s not uncommon for health care workers to access charts without justification, and I suspect that relatively few of those are prosecuted.
In this case, DOJ alleges that Haim falsely claimed that he was currently caring for adult patients as a justification for renewing his credential and gaining access to the system. That raises his violation to a felony. How many of those are prosecuted? My sense is that it is harder to justify not charging the violation when it’s done under false pretenses. There is a willfulness to the violation that precludes claiming that the violation was inadvertent or done in ignorance of the law. I suspect it’s charged more often but I don’t know.
DOJ is also claiming malicious harm, which raises the maximum prison sentence from five years to ten. This strikes me, however, as the weakest element of the indictment. It would be good to know how frequently that is charged and under what circumstances.
Unless we have the answers to these questions, I don’t see how it can be claimed that it’s a selective or political prosecution. It’s something that Haim’s legal team may want to address, but my understanding is that it is generally a hard thing to prove.
Again, it is an excellent question, but we don’t have the answer.
How many times has the DoJ prosecuted under HIPAA?
This is typical political prosecution.
There are protections for whistleblowers, which means you report your concerns to an appropriate government agency. There is no protection for accessing confidential medical records and leaking them to a journalist.
Since you claim to know the law, what is the culpability of Texas Children’s Hospital's (TCH) continued "Gender Affirming Care" (which is in and of itself an oxymoron), after they told WAPO that they had discontinued the practice. Also, what is your definition of "an appropriate government agency"?
I am not disputing what you say about CPS. I am just making the point that he does not qualify for whistleblower status.
I would repeat my point that at the time he leaked the confidential medical records the procedures were not illegal. Immoral, yes. Complete agreement on that point.
You can take the position that what he did merited risking prosecution. But you cannot claim that his actions did not violate medical ethics or that they were not illegal.
Let’s just be clear on all the facts.
You are correct, I imagine, about the legality of what Dr. Haim did.
But in a broader context, what he did was done in good conscience to expose and right what he perceived as a wrong being done to children, and I'd think that the care-taking concern of a physician would/should supersede mere concerns about documents leaked without identifying information on them. Were the children harmed by Dr. Haim's actions? I doubt it. Would TCH be harmed? Yes, and that's the point of the leak, as it exposes practices which we're now beginning to understand aren't based so much on evidence-based medicine or even genuine care for children (how in hell in a 12-year-old able to distinguish gender dysphoria from growing-up dysphoria?) but on blind ideology and a desire for the expansion of technology into our lives and the profit off that.
I speak as one whose daughter is even now captured within that sick system, against my will, and no, I can't even access records about what they're doing to her because of those same HIPAA regulations. The state, through the medical system, now effectively owns my child with regard to these treatments: Hitler would love it ("children are the property of the state.")
And ... exactly what "medical ethics" are we talking about?
Medical confidentiality is a cornerstone of medical ethics. The moment that Dr. Haim accessed those records, he violated medical confidentiality and committed a HIPAA violation. Everyone has a right to that confidentiality, and Dr. Haim decided that the patients of the gender clinic had less rights than he did.
You may take the position that Dr. Haim was justified in his actions in pursuit of a higher good. I happen to disagree. But either way, that doesn´t change the fact he now faces legal consequences that are the direct result of those actions.
I'd argue that informed consent and bodily autonomy are cornerstones of medical ethics, and that medical confidentiality is meaningless when we're asked if we've had a certain vaccine, and if we can't prove that, then we might lose our jobs or be denied access to a venue. And if a parent can't access his child's medical records because of HIPAA-- wait a minute, that's a bit insane. I just want to know regarding my own daughter (13 years old) and I believe I have a right to that, and the state has no right to withhold that information.
Yes, I'd argue that Dr. Haim was pursuing a higher good, but I'd also argue that he did violate HIPAA statues and in fairness should receive some sanction. But to pretend that his punishment should be severe only serves the established corrupt order of things, when on the other hand our HIPAA rights had been violated in spades during Covid and there were, overall, no sanctions at all for that.
I have a question for you. What if going to the appropriate government official to report gets you ignored, fired, or told to shut up?
If you go to an appropriate government agency, you have whistleblower protection. Yes, there is still a risk. But you are not very likely to be prosecuted, and you have legal recourse for any retaliation.
If, on the other hand, you violate HIPAA by entering an electronic medical record and leaking confidential records to a journalist, you are creating a clear trail of evidence that definitely exposes you to prosecution. Haim and Rufo both knew this, or could have easily known this. Haim could have and should have sought legal advice before proceeding in this manner, and Rufo should have insisted that he do so before publishing illegally obtained medical records.
Instead Rufo is making a false and quite frankly ridiculous claim that the redaction of the names precludes a HIPAA violation. This is willful ignorance. All you have to do is read the statute.
The law does not provide whistleblower protection for what Haim did. In fact, neither Rufo nor Haim´s lawyers are claiming that Haim has legal whistleblower protection. Rufo is only saying that it´s a matter to be litigated, which I take to mean that Haim´s lawyers are devising a novel legal theory that goes beyond the letter of the law. I am no lawyer, but that sounds like a longshot. I would not want to bet my freedom on it.
Haim and Rufo were extremely reckless. Claiming that this is a political prosecution does not change these facts. Haim is the one that is likely to pay the price. Rufo is not.
The choices being made about who and what topics to prosecute vs ignore or refuse to charge is the political prosecution in my view. Obviously, the federal government going after him betrays the fact that he couldn't very well go to the government in good faith. I wasn't being facetious when asking, and I appreciate your response.
TCH said they were going to stop the procedures before they become illegal. As far as I know there are no legal consequences for having made a false public statement. As to the situation now, I have no knowledge.
According to the indictment, Haim received training that he should report his concerns to CPS. The other possibility would be a health care regulatory agency.
Daniel, I have some familiarity with CPS as we were foster parents for a number of years. I can assure you that while Child Protective Services may be legally the proper place for such complaints, they would fall on deaf ears. So what is a doctor supposed to do when the very legal agencies to which he should report illegal mutilation of children are doing nothing to stop it and are, in many states, actually facilitating it?
I can't blame Haim at all for not taking that road. He would face the same charges, but without the larger megaphone that Mr. Rufo has provided for him.
Oxford describes a whistleblower as “a person who informs on a person or organization engaged in an illicit activity.” There is no mention of “government agency”. Clearly the Hospital knew these practices were continuing in violation of state law, and that services were being billed illegally. As the author says nearby, this will be litigated. Was Snowden a whistleblower? Was Daniel Ellsberg? If the definition of whistleblower becomes too precise, it will effectively kill one of our most effective means of uncovering criminal wrongdoing.
At the time that Haim accessed the confidential medical records, the practices had not yet been made illegal. So even this dictionary definition does not apply.
Even then, dictionary definitions are beside the point I am making. The law does not depend on common, dictionary definitions, but on statutes. The question is whether Dr. Haim had a legal whistleblower status that mitigates his violation of HIPAA.
HIPAA allows for redacted medical records to be revealed either to a healthcare agency, or to a lawyer that is advising the would-be whistleblower. They do not allow for them to be leaked to a journalist. So this provision does not apply to Haim’s conduct.
And there is nothing in HIPPA that permits an unauthorized individual to access the records of a patient that is not under his care. His intention about what to do with that information is irrelevant. He has committed a HIPPA violation the moment he accesses the record.
Moreover, Haim was not revealing illegal practices; he was revealing that the hospital had made a false statement that the hospital had made claiming that they had discontinued the controversial (but not yet illegal) practices.
If you want to stretch the broad, common definition of whistleblower to cover exposing a false statement by a hospital, well fine. But stretching that definition doesn’t mitigate Haim’s legal exposure, or alter the fact that it is unethical to violate medical confidentiality.
Rufo claims that the question of whistleblower status will be litigated. Perhaps it will, according to a novel legal argument that it has not yet been revealed. If and when it is, the court will have an opportunity, and so will I, to consider the argument.
If I find it persuasive, I may change my mind. Until then, I stand by what I have written.
Yes, and in a broader context freedom of speech-- to speak up and expose perceived wrongdoings-- has traditionally been seen as as effective measure to root out "bad ministers" and government corruption. So we might ask if all this lawfare isn't maneuvering to cover up corporate corruption (of course it is!) in the alliance with what now appears to be the corporate handmaiden: our government that's supposed to protect and preserve our autonomy and freedom of speech, not to mention abuses of our children.
I realize you are correct about protections, but I assume you would agree that had he reported his findings to a government agency, it would be years before anyone would notice, read, respond, investigate, etc. In the story of the dumpster-fire Generic drug company Ranbaxy, it took FDA at least 2 years before they even acknowledged the multitude of emails sent by the whistleblower and then multiple more years to complete their investigation. The system is so badly messed up, I can understand why he did what he did. These are human beings that were being harmed.
I agree that reporting to a government agency would probably have been pointless. My only point was that he cannot legally claim whistleblower protection for leaking to a journalist.
I don´t have any trouble understanding why he did what he did, or why so many consider him a hero. But I still think his actions were unethical and ill-advised. And regardless, as a result of his own actions, he now faces serioius legal consequences.
More than anything, I want to make clear the facts of the matter.
If I had been advising him, I would have suggested that he take his concerns to sympathetic state legislators, in particular the prime movers behind the law that passed after Rufo´s article appeared. They would have had the power to investigate, without compromising patient confidentiality.
I hope and pray that he consulted an attorney before he went public.
It doesn´t seem like he did. No responsible attorney would have advised him to break the law. Though his wife is an attorney.
please keep telling the horrid truth...
Is there any legitimate fund raising vehicle for Haim's defense?
Yes, this is legitimate: https://www.givesendgo.com/texas_whistleblower
Givesendgo, an actual legitimate site, has a donation bucket for "Legal Defense Fund for Surgeon Whistleblower" that goes to this effort. I have donated as have many others.
Thanks
All this trans madness originates from the Obamas. It’s a diabolical strategy for power
Suppression of dissent under bogus charges is all the WOKE/Neo-Marxist fashion these days, don't you know.
For instance, I see that British freedom-fighter Tommy Robinson was arrested yesterday on his speaking tour in Canada. Supposedly for "immigration irregularities". Uh-huh... Took ten officers, apparently, to do the job. Though Tommy did not resist. He is under orders after release not to leave the city of Calgary, which means he cannot continue on his speaking tour.
Oh....so that's what the arrest was all about!
See Rebel News Canada.
In the meantime, Canada has had vast numbers of illegal immigrants flooding over the border between U.S. and Canada at the Roxham Road crossing, and not only were they not stopped or arrested for "immigration irregularities" -- but the RCMP carried their bags for them and arranged taxpayer-covered motels.
By March 2023—when Roxham Road was closed for good—a total of 95,610 irregular asylum seekers had used it to cross into the country.
Anyone with half a brain can see what is going on here.
Obama also pushed the concept of "unconscious bias" and supposedly being trained out of it. A great new industry for his pals. All fabricated nonsense. In terms of Psychology and Neuroscience, there is no such thing. But it sounds expert and official, doesn't it?
Imagine one looks at a society from a historical basis - and mutilating teens is both allowed and done by older experts. And then if someone complains she is, literally, prosecuted. Barbaric, no?
I meant he or she. Oops.
But what about the xi's and the xir's?
Thanks, Mate. I nearly laughed out my nose;)
It is the definition of tyranny.
The FBI and DOJ cannot be reformed. Both government institutions are rotten from the core to the outer skin. I'm sure there is an occasional good faith employee, but they obviously have no power. All that's left to do with both institutions, is abolish them and return their investigations and prosecutions to the states. They've been corrupted and once corruption takes hold, there's no going back. #AbolishTheFBIAndDOJ
My father was a career DOJ attorney. I asked him in late 2017 what happened to the employer from which he retired. He replied that they had brought in attorneys who believed that the law was a club that they could use to impose their agenda and not something that they had to follow.
If you go to the Marco Polo site and open their searchable collection of 125 thousand of Hunter's emails one of the frequent cast members is Louie Freeh former FBI director and former Federal Judge. Freeh is doing a lot of the inside work for Burisma - Meeting with senior State and DOJ officials including his old FBI pals. He had arranged for the head of Burisma to meet with one of the top FBI officials.
With the laptop in the hands of the FBI but still hidden Freeh suddenly changed careers and joined a very large international "consultant" firm with a note in the press release that he would no longer practice law . Most likely he thought there was a good chance that he would be prosecuted for work as part of Team Hunter.
Leslie, this just is not possible. The FBI and DOJ are the enforcement mechanism for federal laws. Without them, how would you enforce the laws against counterfeiting or interstate kidnapping? Yes, they need a huge housecleaning, but so does every other institution in America. That's what happens when you spend 40 years educating your elites to believe postmodernist drivel and hate their own culture and heritage. That's what needs to be fixed. Whether it can be (before it destroys us), I'm not sure.
One of my favorite Jordan Peterson quotes: "If you keep slicing people into ever smaller and smaller groups, you find that each person's combination of oppressions is unique. Intersectionally, everyone is in a group of 1, a unique individual. The logical endpoint of intersectionality is individuality. The intersectionalists will get there, if they don't kill us all first."
Untrue. The DOJ and FBI are fairly new inventions of the Federal government. The states handled these issues before and can certainly do so again. The FBI wasn't a thing until last century and the DOJ isn't much older. Don't let the Feds convince you we need them. We don't.
Fairly new? Both are over 100 years old. Yes, states apprehended and prosecuted federal crimes... prior to the Civil War. We don't live in that world anymore. America bears no resemblance to that world legally, socially, or geographically. The idea that 2024 America can somehow do without any federal law enforcement agency is about as realistic as the libertarian fever dreams of doin away with occupational licensing or going back to the gold standard.
Which means we did without them for roughly 150 years. As for your argument "America bears no resemblance" to that world, you're wrong. People haven't changed. Only technology has. Tax dollars can be used to fund investigations in the states instead of the black hole of federal law enforcement. All we get from them right now is abuse of the justice system and partisan political investigations. Why in God's name would we *keep* funding them at this point? Feel free to enjoy prison as a "domestic terrorist" under this DOJ, but I can do without them and absolutely believe we should. There's more than two ways to skin a cat and we need a new way to provide oversight of your injustice system. Abolishing this cesspool is a good first step. Plus, I don't see you dropping any solutions to these problems. If you've got a better idea then continuing to fund the administrative and politically beholden state, I'm all ears.
People are the same, but their behavior is not. Federal law enforcement sprang out of 2 needs: 1) the post-war civil rights amendments being enforced in the South; 2) increasingly easy interstate travel.
Contra what the Democrats would like people to believe, the first of these has largely abated. However, the second has risen astronomically. In 1865, the majority of Americans still died in their birth state and many in the same county.
I agree that there needs to be additional oversight of DOJ and a major housecleaning. But I just can't see how a society as mobile as ours can function without some type of federal law enforcement.
Honestly, that's just a lack of imagination. I worked in the legal field for nearly 3 decades. With a few new rules regarding interstate crime, it could easily be managed. Regardless, there's no other way to rein in the corruption and weaponization currently dogging the nation's justice system. Once that bridge has been crossed, it falls into the ravine below. We warned the Democrats against opening that door and instead of heeding us, they merrily traipsed through it. We're on an uncharted side of the Rubicon. It's time to burn it to the ground and start over or we're going to see both sides going tit for tat and a whole lot of innocent people are going to pay the price. A few growing pains is worth it if it means we get back to neutrality.
Nothing says Threat To Democracy like a 75 year old woman praying at an abortion clinic.
Reminds me of:
"Police in Birmingham, England, have cited a woman for praying silently near an abortion clinic for a third time, even though Britain’s top legal officer has said such actions are legal."
It seems to be a new Neo-Marxist tactic -- harassing and even arresting non-threatening persons praying near abortion clinics. Another turn-the-world-upside-down tactic. While BLM and Pro-Hamas destructos taking over the public sphere is applauded.
They have The Power....right now.
Bob Dylan - The Times They Are A-Changin'
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=90WD_ats6eE
1964
Lyrics
https://genius.com/Bob-dylan-the-times-they-are-a-changin-lyrics