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美國123 – 開欄文
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我本來想用「美國政情」、「美國報導」、或「美國風情」等做本欄標題；但它們或過於狹隘，或大而無當；難以滿足提綱挈領的功能。現在這個標題雖然不夠理想，至少俏皮一些。
由於當下的熱門話題在「政治」，以下先轉載兩篇這方面的評論。
扎卡瑞阿先生大作討論美國「國力」(本欄第二篇)。我不確定他所引用統計數字和他論點之間的相關性有多大，但一般而言，我同意他的看法。我曾說過，百足之蟲，死而不僵；50 – 100年內美國還是能夠跟中國平起平坐。此之謂：「瘦死的駱駝比馬大」。這也是我一向主張「中、美和則兩利，鬥則俱傷」的原因之一。這篇文章甚長，一時之間我也無法全部消化。有空再寫讀後。
奈教授曾任美國國安和外交官員；他的大作從外交政策討論美國明年大選結果對未來走勢的影響(本欄第三篇)。他對「美國優越論」基礎的分析，我並不苟同。以後有空再做評論。
除了政治評論外，有機會我會選擇一些其它方面的報導與分析。
我在美國住了近26年，在1993回台定居以前，我在美國的時間比我在中國的時間要長。在美期間，除了工作之外，我也花了些時間了解和接觸美國文化、企業、政治、社會、科技、和人群；雖然都只能說是皮毛，但在「認識美國」上還是不無小補。
如上所說，我真正的成長期在美國，根據「社會建構論」，我的行為與思考方式免不了些許美式「作風」。例如，我的「務實模式」與「現實主義」大都源於過去在美國的生活經驗。此外，我的「行文風格」常常不合中國士大夫「溫柔敦厚」的傳統，除了來自盧卡契的「意識型態」理論外，有一部分也受到美國學者間相互批評文字的影響。
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美國政黨政治的始作俑者-Ted Scheinman
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樊比仁是美國第八任總統。
Martin Van Buren Created America’s Partisan Political System. We’re Still Recovering
The eighth president of the United States, the so-called little magician, saw political parties as the key to achieving power
Ted Scheinman, January/February 2025
When Martin Van Buren arrived in Washington to be sworn in as a senator in 1821, he told a friend he planned to “build up a party” for himself. It was an odd time to be party-mongering, and Van Buren an unlikely party-monger. Republican James Monroe had run unopposed in the 1820 presidential election, and “every politician in Washington, with varying degrees of enthusiasm … was calling himself a Republican,” writes James M. Bradley in Martin Van Buren: America’s First Politician, a lively and illuminating new biography of our eighth president—the first to be born a U.S. citizen. Absent a strong opposition party, Van Buren lamented that politicians were appealing less to ideals and more to personalities, and wished, as he put it in an 1827 letter, to unite citizens through “party principle,” rather than “personal preference.”
Born in 1782 to a tavern-keeping family in Kinderhook, New York, Van Buren had little schooling but made himself a lawyer, rising to the heights of power despite his lack of military experience or strong family ties to ensure patronage. At 5-foot-6, he was considered notably short, and friends and foes called him the “little magician” for his outsize political talents. He proceeded swiftly from senator to secretary of state, vice president and president. And though he failed to win a second term, Bradley says, “He built and designed the party system that defined how politics was practiced and power wielded in the United States.” We are living in the world Van Buren created.
In the first decades of the Republic, leaders had generally called themselves Federalists or Republicans, but “few imagined that parties would be a permanent feature of the nation’s political life,” Bradley writes. “They expected parties to disband once the Republic was more secure and its great issues settled.” Van Buren plowed ahead, with the thoroughly modern view that parties were not a regrettable necessity but a revolutionary means of achieving and using power. With Andrew Jackson, he co-founded the Democratic Party in 1828, cannily banking on Jackson’s personal appeal to win that year’s election; Van Buren became Jackson’s vice president, and the Democrats dominated politics until 1860. “He didn’t think that politics should be a hobby for gentlemen to practice in their spare time,” Bradley says. “A party had to have an organization, a structure, a personality, and it should be run by professionals.”
As early as 1819, Van Buren had called slavery “a moral evil,” but he appeased its partisans frequently. “There was a dark side to Van Buren’s ascendancy,” Bradley writes. “The Democratic Party became a vehicle for the expansion of slavery, the forced expulsion and dispossession of Native peoples from the eastern United States, and imperial conquest of the West.” Indeed, Van Buren helped professionalize the use of race “in different and effective ways as a wedge issue in elections and political debates,” Bradley says. “These practices are still very prevalent today.” The main difference? “Van Buren never could have conceived of a party system where big money plays such an enormous role.” Still, Bradley says, “in many ways,” today’s politicians “are using [Van Buren’s] playbook.”
Ted Scheinman is a senior editor for Smithsonian magazine. He is the author of Camp Austen: My Life as an Accidental Jane Austen Superfan.
Filed Under: American History, American Presidents, Political Leaders, Politics
This article is a selection from the January/February 2025 issue of Smithsonian magazine
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「三權分立」在美國還行得通嗎？ -- John Fritze
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中國有句老話：「物必先腐也而后虫生之」；美國聯邦最高法院中，坐著一到兩位性侵疑犯，兩位納賄犯；要想別人不忽視其決定都難。何況，羅伯慈首席大法官帶頭吹、舔後(該欄2024/07/07)，還妄想「司法獨立」，這不是找罵挨嗎？這又應了中國另一句老話：「人必自侮，然後人侮之」
Roberts warns against ignoring Supreme Court rulings as tension with Trump looms
John Fritze, CNN, 01/01/25
Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts slammed what he described as “dangerous” talk by some officials about ignoring federal court rulings, using an annual report weeks before President-elect Donald Trump takes office to stress the importance of an independent judiciary.
Officials “from across the political spectrum have raised the specter of open disregard for federal court rulings,” Roberts wrote in the report, released by the Supreme Court on Tuesday. “These dangerous suggestions, however sporadic, must be soundly rejected.”
The chief justice didn’t detail which officials he had in mind – and both Republicans and Democrats have hinted at ignoring court rulings in recent years. Still, Roberts’ year-end message landed days before the January 20 inauguration of a president who has repeatedly decried the federal judiciary as rigged.
Trump’s agenda – particularly on immigration – could put the incoming president on a collision course next year with a Supreme Court he has helped to build by naming three conservative justices during his first term.
“Every administration suffers defeats in the court system – sometimes in cases with major ramifications,” Roberts wrote. And yet, he added, “for the past several decades,” both parties have respected court decisions and have headed off the kind of constitutional confrontations that arose during the civil rights era when some southern states declined court orders to integrate.
Roberts, in particular, pointed to decisions by the Eisenhower and Kennedy administrations to enforce school desegregation rulings. In 1957, for instance, President Dwight Eisenhower sent the 101st Airborne Division to Little Rock to integrate its schools after officials sought to defy Supreme Court decisions that found segregated schools unconstitutional.
Roberts lamented that “public officials,” whom he also did not name, had “regrettably” attempted to intimidate judges by “suggesting political bias in the judge’s adverse rulings without a credible basis for such allegations.” Those attempts, he warned, are “inappropriate and should be vigorously opposed.”
As in past years, the chief justice avoided direct mention of the controversies and challenges brewing within the Supreme Court itself – including lingering questions about ethics, a weekslong scandal this year over controversial flags hoisted at Justice Samuel Alito’s properties and sagging public confidence in the nation’s highest court.
In a series of interviews before the election, Vice President-elect JD Vance raised doubts about his fidelity to Supreme Court decisions. In a 2021 podcast, as The New York Times previously reported, Vance urged Trump to respond to adverse court rulings “like Andrew Jackson did and say, ‘The chief justice has made his ruling. Now let him enforce it.’”
The likely apocryphal quote came in response to an 1832 decision Jackson opposed that dealt with Native Americans.
Trump himself has often blasted federal courts – including the Supreme Court – over adverse decisions. A spokesman for Trump’s campaign earlier this week slammed the “political weaponization of our justice system” in a response to a federal appeals court ruling in New York that upheld a jury’s verdict finding that the former president sexually abused writer E. Jean Carroll.
Democrats, too, have toyed publicly with declining to enforce court decisions. New York Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez drew criticism last year for suggesting on CNN that the Biden administration “ignore” a district court decision that would have halted Food and Drug Administration of the abortion pill mifepristone. The Supreme Court paused that decision and, in June, tossed the lawsuit challenging wider access to the drug.
Roberts has repeatedly used his year-end report to tout the importance of an independent judiciary and to sound an alarm about threats of violence against judges. Two years ago, in a similar vein, he stressed that “a judicial system cannot and should not live in fear.”
In this year’s report, Roberts added that “hostile foreign state actors” had accelerated attacks on the judiciary and other branches. In some instances, he said, “bots distort judicial decisions, using fake or exaggerated narratives to foment discord within our democracy.”
The report lands at the end of a year in which the conservative 6-3 majority granted former presidents sweeping immunity from criminal prosecution – and on a timeline that allowed Trump to avoid a trial on federal charges in two cases before the November election. This fall, the court is delving into transgender care bans and a First Amendment challenge to a bipartisan ban on TikTok.
“The role of the judicial branch,” Roberts wrote, is “to say what the law is.”
But, he added, “judicial independence is undermined unless the other branches are firm in their responsibility to enforce the court’s decrees.”
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我不記得是否有人在歷史學或國際政治領域用過「後美國」一詞。讀完這篇報導後(該欄2024/12/31)，我相信2025在後世很有可能被戲稱為： 1 A. A. (1 Anno Americana)。我這樣說的理由有三個：
1) 它是川普2.0的第1年；也就是美國加速衰落的開始。
2) 金磚九國將正式朝「大金磚」(或金磚國協)邁進(該欄開欄文)。此處請參考文末所附「相關閱讀」。
3) 美國政府將對烏克蘭戰爭制定新政策。如果川普不再繼續支援烏國，世局將立即呈現以下兩個狀況之一：
3a) 北大西洋公約國家取代美國成為支援烏克蘭的主角；或者
3b) 俄國佔據烏國全部或大部份土地。
不論最後出現那一種情況，它們都是美國退出世界舞台的序曲。
此外，印尼、泰國、和馬來西亞加入「大金磚」別具意義，其立竿見影的作用是：
a) 由於它們是「東協」會員，美國主導的AUKUS和「印太聯盟」將名存實亡。
b) 它們也都是東南亞地區舉足輕重的國家。三國的加入將成為「全球南方諸國」的風向指標。G-7或將淪為二流國際組織。
這是我以上「後美國」觀點的基礎。
相關閱讀(包括各篇文章提供的超連接)：
* 大金磚的魅力
* 《金磚世界秩序的到來》要點譯述
* 金磚五國近況及展望
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「後真相」之社媒戰和網路戰 - Matt Hamilton
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這是最近在美國媒體上炒得火紅的案子。我並不熟悉案情，對它也沒有什麼興趣。轉載這個「八卦」的原因在於：給《如何面對「後真相」時代》提供一個案例(該欄2024/12/28)。狄拉福羅爾教授坐在象牙塔中，自說自話的分析「後真相」；這篇報導則呈現「後真相」在現實生活的「功能」-- 摧毀對手的武器。
The question sending shockwaves through Hollywood: How did Blake Lively get those damaging texts?
Matt Hamilton, 12/29/24
When actress Blake Lively went public this month with the explosive accusation that her “It Ends With Us” co-star and producer Justin Baldoni and his team developed a campaign to "smear" her in the press for reporting on-set sexual harassment, she marshaled powerful evidence: her opponents’ own words.
A trove of text messages Lively submitted to California’s Civil Rights Department appeared to show Baldoni, his production company and two publicists affiliated with the company plotting "social manipulation," among other tactics, to fend off any airing of Lively's grievances and preserve Baldoni's reputation.
"All of this will be most importantly untraceable," Melissa Nathan, one of the crisis publicists, said in a text.
The text messages — rife with bravado, boasts and intrigue — have fueled a scandal that has rocked the entertainment industry and spotlighted the ruthless underbelly of the Hollywood publicity machine.
Baldoni’s attorney, Bryan Freedman, has denied the existence of a smear campaign and said that the “cherry-picked correspondence” showed normal internal planning for crisis scenarios on a film that grossed more than $350 million. Freedman said the planning came after Lively “enlisted her own representative … to plant negative and completely fabricated and false stories with media.”
Amid the damaging revelations, one question has stood out: How did Lively and her team obtain the candid, private chats of Baldoni’s public relations team?
The answer in part shows the tangled web of personalities and businesses drawn into the dispute, and the confluence of legal and public relations strategies at play.
“I’ve never seen a case like this,” said Neville Johnson, the veteran entertainment litigator who has represented actors, musicians and other artists for nearly 50 years. Calling it “modern warfare in law,” Johnson was surprised on two fronts: the lengths to which publicists allegedly went to protect Baldoni, and that Lively’s team had procured such a potent tranche of text messages before filing their California civil rights complaint. “The biggest battle we face these days is obtaining evidence from the other side.”
Lively’s attorneys have been circumspect about the provenance of the text messages. Her complaint contains a footnote stating that the messages, including a 22-page compendium of texts submitted as an exhibit with the complaint, came through the "legal process, including a civil subpoena.” Some of the messages are redacted or have the senders’ and recipients’ names omitted.
But Stephanie Jones, the founder of Jonesworks — the publicity firm that has represented Tom Brady, Jeff Bezos and, until recently, Baldoni and his production company, Wayfarer Studios — effectively outed herself as the source of the damaging communications in a lawsuit she filed Dec. 24.
With Jonesworks as the publicity firm for Baldoni and his company, Jones would seemingly have been aware of the alleged smear campaign against Lively. But Jones disavows involvement and contends that a former subordinate, Jennifer Abel, and others close to Baldoni cooked up the plan as part of a broader "conspiracy," which also included starting a rival publicity firm.
In her lawsuit, Jones accused Abel of "conspiring" to attack Jonesworks, steal the firm's clients, coordinate the “media smear campaign” against Lively and then “publicly pin blame for this smear campaign on Jones.”
In addition to suing Abel, Jones sued Baldoni and Nathan, the crisis public relations professional whose blunt text messages have rocketed across social media.
The dizzying set of allegations in Jones’ 52-page lawsuit made clear that after terminating Abel on Aug. 21, Jones had Abel’s company-issued phone “forensically preserved and examined in detail.”
"Abel and Nathan’s covert take down and smear campaigns were revealed in black and white on Abel’s company-issued phone following her termination," Jones said in her lawsuit.
In a statement, a member of Lively’s legal team confirmed that the text messages in Lively’s complaint were sourced from Abel’s phone and that the material came from a subpoena against Jonesworks.
How, when and where that subpoena was issued remains a mystery.
“The additional details about Ms. Lively’s investigation, including the lawful subpoena, will be produced during discovery,” the statement said.
Experts were at times flummoxed and impressed by how Lively managed to get hold of the text messages in the absence of a lawsuit. The state civil rights complaint she filed, which alleged sexual harassment and retaliation, could be a precursor to a lawsuit.
Some states, including California and New York, allow for discovery, or the gathering of evidence from various parties to learn about the facts of a dispute, before a lawsuit has been filed. But this type of pre-litigation discovery rarely happens in California, attorneys said.
If Lively’s lawyers took that route in California, they would have had to know that the evidence existed in the first place, then petition a judge and argue that there was a risk the evidence could be spoiled or not preserved. A spokesperson for the L.A. Superior Court said the court does not maintain records of such petitions.
“I’ve been doing this for decades and I’ve never seen it done before, but it can be done,” said Johnson, the entertainment lawyer. As an example, he said, lawyers may seek a subpoena to prevent a car involved in a crash from being demolished and request to examine it before filing suit.
James Spertus, a West Los Angeles litigator and former federal prosecutor, said the subpoena was “most likely” issued in another case and “then used in this one.”
For example, the subpoena could have been issued during a closed-door arbitration proceeding, attorneys said. Lively's complaint named several firms and PR professionals involved in "It Ends With Us" as well as Baldoni's production company, but Jones and Jonesworks were notably absent. Attorneys for Jones did not respond to an email seeking comment about the subpoena.
Some attorneys speculated that the subpoena had the hallmarks of a so-called “friendly subpoena,” where one side is seeking records from another party, who can use the subpoena as legal cover. Put another way, the owner of the records may want to give them up, and the subpoena allows them to say they were forced to comply.
Whatever the origin story, the texts have been curated and released by both Jones and Lively, effectively torpedoing their adversaries in one fell swoop.
The potency of the texts derives from their moment-to-moment chronicle of how Baldoni and his team discussed Lively. In a strategy document for Baldoni that Lively filed with her complaint, his publicity team identified "several potential scenarios at play here which we should be prepared for, should [Lively] and her team make her grievances public."
“He wants to feel like she can be buried,” Abel wrote of Baldoni in a text message.
“We can’t write it down to him. We can’t write we will destroy her,” Nathan replied to Abel. “You know we can bury anyone. But I can’t write that to him.”
The precise nature of the help that Nathan and her firm, The Agency Group PR, provided to Baldoni and his production company is unclear. The text messages suggest that the publicists pitched negative stories about Lively to friendly media outlets. In her complaint, Lively alleged that Nathan enlisted Jed Wallace, formerly of Southern California and now based in Texas, who in turn "weaponized a digital army ... to create, seed and promote content that appeared to be authentic on social media platforms and internet chat forums."
Then, Baldoni's team supplied the "manufactured content to unwitting reporters," propagating a narrative that was negative toward Lively and her husband, actor Ryan Reynolds.
A Daily Mail piece from this summer was published with the headline, “Is Blake Lively set to be CANCELLED?” and noted "hard to watch" videos of Lively that had surfaced online, triggering "a growing backlash against apparently diva-style behaviour caught on camera."
Abel texted Nathan, “You really outdid yourself with this piece.”
“That’s why you hired me right? I’m the best,” Nathan replied.
According to Lively's complaint, Baldoni's team was trying to keep Lively's allegations about his improper behavior from leaking online and in the press. In text messages cited in the complaint, Nathan appears to indicate that news coverage of human resources complaints stemming from "It Ends With Us" was scuttled through the team's efforts.
Lively's complaint asserted that Baldoni criticized her body and weight, was "constantly hugging and touching cast and crew" and inserted "improvised gratuitous sexual content" into the film, which is about a woman overcoming domestic abuse.
Lively also said that Baldoni "pressured" her into adding nudity into a scene where her character was to give birth and that the "chaotic" set was open to cast and crew; that Baldoni's production partner, Jamey Heath, had showed Lively a video of his own wife's naked body as she gave birth, which Lively initially thought was pornography; and that Baldoni had his "best friend" play the role of gynecologist, which was "invasive and humiliating."
Before the cast resumed filming after the Hollywood strikes, Lively initiated a meeting about her allegations, according to the complaint. Other female cast and crew members had also reported concerns about the work environment, including sexual harassment. The producers agreed to institute protections against this behavior.
Baldoni's representatives have denied misconduct and called the allegations against him and his team "completely false, outrageous and intentionally salacious."
Freedman, the attorney, said in a statement that Lively's "negative reputation" derived from "her own remarks and actions during the campaign for the film" along with "interviews and press activities that were observed publicly, in real time and unedited, which allowed for the internet to generate their own views and opinions."
The high-profile case — a decade after the hack and release of Sony Pictures executives' crude and frank emails — has offered an evergreen reminder: Be careful what you put in writing.
ABC News recently paid $15 million to settle a case filed by President-elect Donald Trump, who alleged that anchor George Stephanopolous defamed him. The settlement talks came after the judge ruled that Stephanopoulos and Trump had to sit for depositions and turn over emails and text messages.
In a lawsuit filed against Fox News by Dominion Voting Systems, internal emails and text messages emerged that showed the unvarnished opinions of Tucker Carlson and other Fox personalities around Trump’s bogus claims that the 2020 election was stolen. “Do the executives understand how much trust and credibility we’ve lost with our audience? We’re playing with fire, for real,” Carlson texted colleagues.
In the dispute between singer Kesha Sebert and the songwriter and producer Lukasz Gottwald, known as Dr. Luke, whom she accused of sexually assaulting her, the producer’s harsh comments about the singer’s weight became public during litigation.
“Please keep her on her diet. No need to reply further. THANKS!” Gottwald wrote.
The dispute also unearthed the public relations plan that Sebert’s team devised to help amplify her case, incite "a deluge of negative media" on Gottwald, fuel the #FreeKesha movement and secure a more favorable contract arrangement.
To Melanie Cherry, the associate director of the Public Relations and Advertising program at USC Annenberg School of Communications and Journalism, the Lively case will further reinforce “why publicists and crisis PR teams must be diligent in keeping communications with clients and internal teams secure and private.”
“The role of a publicist should remain in the background,” she said, “rather than becoming part of the story.”
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Read more:
Justin Baldoni's ex-publicist sues over alleged Blake Lively smear campaign
As Blake Lively sues 'It Ends With Us' co-star Justin Baldoni, collaborators take her side
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民主政治與貪汙 -- S. Tareen
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請參看此短評(該欄2024/12/13)。
Secretly recorded videos are backbone of corruption trial for longest-serving legislative leader
Sophia Tareen, 12/12/24
CHICAGO (AP) — Hours of secretly recorded videos and phone calls have offered a rare glimpse into how the longest-serving legislative leader in American history operated behind closed doors.
As the corruption trial of former Illinois House Speaker Michael Madigan stretches into its third month, testimony has covered his multiple alleged schemes, from kickbacks involving the state’s largest utility company to Chinatown developments benefiting his private tax firm.
Jurors have heard from a congresswoman, former state legislators and the government’s star witness: a former Chicago alderman who secretly wore a wire.
Here’s a closer look at the ongoing trial:
The charges
Madigan, who was speaker for over three decades, is charged in a 23-count indictment for bribery, racketeering, wire fraud and other crimes.
Prosecutors allege he exploited his unmatched influence not only as the Illinois House speaker but also as head of the state's Democratic Party for personal gain and to amass even more power. A tax attorney, he’s also accused of benefiting from private work that was illegally steered to his law firm.
The trial has shown how Madigan worked, with the lines between his political and personal roles intertwined.
For instance, meetings often took place at his downtown law office, whether they were for political or legal work. Elected officials or his political advisors were often present alongside business contacts. Even in meetings about tax work, he was called “the speaker," the recordings show.
In one 2014 meeting secretly recorded by a businessman also working undercover, a City Council member introduced Madigan to hotel developers for a Chinatown project. Madigan pitched his firm’s business.
“We’re not interested in a quick killing here. We’re interested in a long-term relationship,” Madigan said. “In terms of the quality of representation that you get from this law firm, we don’t take a second seat to anybody. “
Afterward, the alderman told a businessman: “If he works with the speaker, he will get anything he needs for that hotel.”
Star witness
One of the most-anticipated parts of the trial has been the testimony of former Chicago Alderman Danny Solis. A council member for 23 years, Solis led the powerful zoning committee.
As Madigan sought business for his tax firm, Solis met with Madigan over projects in the alderman’s ward, which then included Chinatown and the trendy West Loop neighborhood near downtown.
But unknown to everyone — including his family — Solis was working for federal agents, recording meetings and phone calls.
“It was critical that the undercover work I was doing remain secret,” Solis, 75, testified in court.
He told jurors that federal agents approached him in June 2016 and he agreed to cooperate to avoid prison for admitted wrongdoing including bribery.
However, Solis could be a problematic witness.
He faced massive financial issues, marital problems after an affair and ethical lapses, including accepting favors from a developer who arranged for Solis to get Viagra and massages “that turned sexual.” He also testified he acted on requests from federal agents, including proposing that Madigan appoint him to a board after he left office.
Defense attorneys called Solis unreliable and blasted his financial wrongdoing, including misspending campaign funds for a trip to Puerto Rico, his son’s school tuition and a car.
“As an alderman and as chair of the zoning committee, you committed many crimes, is that correct?” Madigan attorney Daniel Collins asked Solis during cross examination.
“Yes,” Solis said.
Other witnesses have included U.S. Rep. Nikki Budzinksi, who testified about Madigan’s influence in 2018 while she worked as an advisor for Gov. JB Pritzker.
The recordings
Some of the Solis videos are shaky and it's unclear how he recorded them. There’s extended footage of ceilings and office walls. Many calls are short.
But they show how Madigan, who famously didn't have a cellphone or email address, operated.
In January 2018, Madigan called up Solis and asked about a proposed West Loop apartment building.
“Is that going to go ahead? You know why I’m interested,” Madigan says.
Solis asks if Madigan knew the developers.
“No, but I’d like to,” he says.
Solis told jurors that Madigan’s influence would be helpful to him, so he provided introductions.
“I wanted to curry political favor with Mr. Madigan,” Solis told jurors.
The schemes
A sweeping investigation of public corruption in Illinois has already produced convictions of other elected officials and Madigan’s former chief of staff.
Among other schemes, Madigan is accused of using his influence to pass legislation favorable to electric utility ComEd. In return, ComEd allegedly offered Madigan loyalists kickbacks, contracts and jobs where they did little or no work.
“When Madigan saw an opportunity to enrich himself, he took it,” Assistant U.S. Attorney Sarah Streicker told jurors.
Defense attorneys have painted Madigan as a devoted public servant, calling him "incorruptible.”
Madigan, who has has “adamantly” denied wrongdoing in the past, hasn't spoken publicly during the trial. He spends the proceedings watching witnesses and jurors intently, often taking notes. Family members including his daughter, former Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan, have attended court.
Also standing trial with Madigan is longtime confidant Michael McClain, 76, who already has been found guilty in a separate, related case. Last year, federal jurors convicted McClain and three others of the bribery conspiracy involving ComEd.
The trial is expected to extend into mid-January.
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兩大天后之惺惺相惜 -- Gina Vivinetto
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關於兩大天后的報導請看此欄和此欄。
Taylor Swift gave Caitlin Clark an inspirational note — and a special invitation
Clark, who was named Time's 2024 Athlete of the Year, has a blossoming friendship with Swift.
Gina Vivinetto, 12/11/24
Caitlin Clark had a very big year thanks to a breakout rookie season in the WNBA and a burgeoning friendship with Taylor Swift.
The Indiana Fever guard was named Time's 2024 Athlete of the Year on Dec. 10, and the publication's story on Clark notes that Swift gave her four bags of "Eras Tour" merchandise along with a sweet note about her being inspiring to watch from afar.
In her note, Swift told the 22-year-old pro basketball star, who saw the pop singer perform in Indianapolis, that she and her boyfriend, Kansas City Chiefs tight end Travis Kelce, were excited to see Clark play in person since the "Eras Tour" was winding down, according to Time. (Swift referred to herself and Kelce as "Trav and I.")
Swift also invited Clark to attend a Chiefs game with her.
The 2024 WNBA Rookie of the Year attended back-to-back "Eras Tour" concerts at Lucas Oil Stadium in Indianapolis in November, where she met Kelce and Swift’s mom, Andrea Swift, according to Time.
When Swift's star-struck fans spotted Clark in one of the stadium’s suites, they reacted by snapping pics and tossing friendship bracelets to her.
“People are just going crazy that I’m there,” said Clark. “I thought people would be so in their own world, ready to see Taylor. And it was just completely the opposite.”
Clark’s comments come on the heels of a funny video the Iowa women's basketball team X account shared in January that showed Clark, dressed in a hoodie and puffer jacket, singing along to Swift’s 2010 song “Enchanted.”
At one point during the clip, Clark excitedly screams, “Taylor Swift! Whoo!” into the camera while her then-Hawkeyes teammate Hannah Stuelke looks on with a baffled expression.
Clark then yells out lyrics from the song’s finale that beg a lover not to love someone else.
TODAY reveals Time’s 2024 Athlete and CEO of the year
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行行出大富翁 -- Liz Roscher
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這種天價行情只可能發生在美國，故置於此欄。這個行情反映美國的國力、社會結構、和老百姓的購買力；高唱美國衰敗論者，不是無知，就是在一廂情願。
How does Juan Soto's $765 million contract compare to the richest contracts in NFL, NBA, NHL, MLB?
Juan Soto's new contract is the richest known deal in the history of sports
Liz Roscher, 12/09/24
Juan Soto just got paid. He reportedly agreed Sunday with the New York Mets on a 15-year, $765 million deal, according to multiple sources.
Soto's contract is the richest known deal in the history of sports. How does it compare to the largest deals in the NFL, NBA, NHL and the rest of MLB? Let's take a look.
NFL: Patrick Mahomes, 10 years, $477 million (AAV $47.7 million)
Kansas City Chiefs quarterback Patrick Mahomes signed the richest contract in NFL history in 2020, blowing away pretty much every other "huge" contract in the NFL. At the time, he and the Chiefs (along with head coach Andy Reid) had just won their first Super Bowl together after making the team's first appearance in 50 years. Since then, Mahomes has helped lead the Chiefs to three more Super Bowls, winning the past two.
NFL honorable mention: Dak Prescott, 4 years, $240 million (AAV $60 million)
Mahomes' contract is the largest in total value, but Prescott's four-year, $240 million deal with the Dallas Cowboys deserves a mention. It's less than one-third the size of Soto's deal in both years and money, but it makes Prescott the highest paid player in NFL history for those four years, as he's making $60 million per year, or about $15 million more than what Mahomes makes per year. It's not the richest deal in total, but Cowboys owner Jerry Jones crammed a lot of money into just a handful of years to keep Prescott in Dallas. Prescott's deal does beat Soto's contract in annual value (Soto will make $51 million per year), which is why it gets a spot on this list.
MLB: Shohei Ohtani, 10 years, $700 million (AAV $70 million)
When news of Shohei Ohtani's contract with the Los Angeles Dodgers was reported on Dec. 9, 2023, he broke the record for largest deal in MLB history in both total value and average annual value. The record had, until then, belonged to his former teammate Mike Trout, who signed a 12-year, $426.5 million contract extension with the Los Angeles Angels several years earlier. While Ohtani will likely own the MLB record for AAV for years to come, Soto surpassed him in both years and total value. That said, because of deferrals, MLB calculates Ohtani's deal, when adjusted for inflation, to be worth approximately $460 million for luxury tax purposes. Soto's deal reportedly contains no deferrals.
NBA: Jayson Tatum, 5 years, $314 million (AAV $62.8 million)
Jaylen Brown's five-year, $303 million contract was in this spot until summer 2024, when the Boston Celtics signed Brown's teammate Jayson Tatum to a five-year, $314 million deal. You won't find contracts longer than five years in the NBA, but the annual value of those five-year deals can reach MLB proportions. The annual value of Tatum's deal surpasses Soto's, but Soto still has the advantage in total value.
NHL: Alex Ovechkin, 13 years, $124 million (AAV $9.5 million)
Every other contract on this list is either in process or about to be started. But Alex Ovechkin's contract has already ended. He signed his massive deal with the Washington Capitals in 2008, and it remains the largest in NHL history. Ovechkin has stayed with the Capitals since the conclusion of his contract in 2020, signing a series of shorter deals to keep him with the only NHL team he has ever played for.
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空中大盜是他？！ ----- Tim Newcomb
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請參看本欄2024/02/29貼文。
A Secret Parachute in the FBI’s Possession May Have Finally Solved D.B. Cooper’s Identity
Tim Newcomb, 11/26/24
"Hearst Magazines and Yahoo may earn commission or revenue on some items through these links."
* The children of a D.B. Cooper suspect handed over new evidence to the FBI because they think their dad was the culprit.
* A parachute long hidden on family property in North Carolina is said to match the type used in the only unsolved skyjacking in U.S. history.
* The suspect in question was arrested for a similar skyjacking just months following the D.B. Cooper event.
The children of convicted skyjacker Richard McCoy II believed their dear old dad may have been D.B. Cooper, the notorious (and notoriously unidentified) central figure in 1971’s unsolved skyjacking. It’s the only one in United States history, in fact, without an answer—until, perhaps, now.
Just months after the Cooper incident, McCoy was convicted of an incredibly similar skyjacking that also included a parachute jump. His children, Chanté and Richard III (Rick), have long thought the clues added up.
They may now have evidence to back up their suspicions.
Chanté and Rick had kept quiet out of consideration for their mother, Karen, who they believed was potentially complicit in both crimes. But as both parents are now deceased, the opportunity arose for the siblings to come forward with their suspicions. And, crucially, they seem to have hard evidence: a modified parachute that they (and amateur D.B. Cooper sleuth Dan Gryder) believe was used in the daring escape.
“That rig is literally one in a billion,” Gryder told Cowboy State Daily after releasing a series on YouTube about his suspicions. It was that YouTube series, Gryder said, that drew the FBI back into the case.
According to Gryder, the FBI now has the parachute and harness that were once tucked away in a storage shed on family property in North Carolina, along with a harness and a skydiving logbook that Chanté claims show D.B. Cooper’s movements near Oregon and Utah (the locations of the two skyjacking events). This is the first real movement from the FBI on the case since the bureau closed it in 2016—even if some former personnel claimed it remained secretly open.
After receiving the new evidence, the FBI followed up with the family and searched the property where the parachute was stored for four hours with more than a dozen agents, according to Gryder. The unique alterations to the parachute may hold the key to the new evidence’s value in the 50-plus-year-old case. The FBI knows the original parachutes were altered by Earl Cossey, a veteran skydiver, who was working with the FBI until his murder in his home in 2013. If the new find matches what they already know, it could provide a boost in the search for the real D.B. Cooper.
The D.B. Cooper case has taken on a borderline mythical quality, with countless theories posed by amateur sleuths online, in books, and in documentaries. One 1990s book—D.B. Cooper: The Real McCoy—even claimed McCoy was the culprit, but the book was pulled from print after Karen sued, claiming libel.
On November 24, 1971, D.B. Cooper—he called himself Dan, but the media misreported the name as D.B.—paid $18.52 in cash for a one-way ticket to Portland, and boarded Northwest Orient Flight 305 without offering any identification (due to a lack of regulations at the time).
Holding a briefcase and a paper sack, Cooper passed a note to a flight attendant seated behind him halfway through the flight and whispered that she better look at the note since he had a bomb. Cooper opened his briefcase to reveal what appeared to be a bomb, and relayed his demands for $200,000, multiple parachutes, and a refueling truck waiting in Seattle so he could take off again, bound for Mexico City.
After Cooper’s demands were met, the scheduled 30-minute flight extended into a two-hour loop over the Puget Sound while ground crews prepared. Cooper released the airliner’s 35 passengers and some crew members, then dictated the flight path and aircraft configuration to the remaining crew—demanding specific speeds, flap angles, and more. With these negotiations complete, Cooper and the four remaining crew members took off again.
Somewhere still over Washington, Cooper then opened the rear staircase and parachuted from the plane, but the exact location and timing of that jump is unknown. Immediate searches yielded no evidence, and over the years, experts have been unable to determine an exact search area due to the multiple variables involved in the night jump.
One of the only real pieces of evidence left by Cooper was a $1.49 clip-on tie from JCPenney, which the FBI holds. Sleuths have sued the government for access to the DNA and the particles left on the tie, but to no avail.
Having the actual parachute would expand the evidence in the case by vast amounts.
McCoy is an intriguing suspect—one who was later passed over because many FBI personnel had come to believe that the real D.B. Cooper died in the jump by the time McCoy surfaced as a possibility. And McCoy didn’t exactly match the physical description, as he was much younger—27 years old at the time—than the original estimation of Cooper’s mid-40s age.
McCoy would have had the have the chops to commit the famous crime, though. He proved it in April of 1972, when he successfully pulled off the skyjacking of a United Airlines flight after demanding $500,000. He boarded the plane in Denver, and was able to get it diverted to San Francisco, have his demands met, and force the plane back into the air. McCoy then jumped from the plane over Utah and was arrested by the FBI within three days, thanks to an anonymous tip. That tip then led the FBI to a waitress who remembered serving him a milkshake at a roadside hamburger stand the night of the skyjacking, and a teenager who said McCoy paid him $5 to give him a ride from the stand into a nearby town. Eventually, they were able to match his fingerprints ones left on the demand note.
McCoy was arrested after the FBI raided his home. He was convicted and sentenced to 45 years in prison, but eventually broke out of a maximum-security prison and evaded capture for three months until he was shot by police in Virginia in 1974.
The parachute offers the best chance at evidence that could potentially link McCoy to Cooper. “This,” Gryder said, “will definitely prove it was McCoy.”
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美國大學運動員不再打白工 -- Ross Dellenger
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NCAA, Power Five conferences vote to approve $2.8B settlement in House, Hubbard and Carter cases
Ross Dellenger, Senior College Football Reporter, 05/24/24
In the spring of 2021, attorneys for the NCAA, appearing before the U.S. Supreme Court, argued vehemently against providing each college athlete with additional cash annually.
The amount: $5,980.
Three years later, in a landmark agreement that will transform the course of major college athletics, the organization left behind its archaic rules, shook off its long-time amateurism argument and thrust the industry into an era of direct athlete compensation.
The amount: more than $15 billion in new cash is expected to funnel to athletes over the duration of the 10-year agreement.
The NCAA and power conferences cast votes this week in support of settling three antitrust cases (House, Hubbard and Carter), approving terms that feature nearly $2.8 billion in back damages; a future athlete revenue-sharing model that will cost major conferences a cumulative $1 billion-plus annually; and other potential changes to the association’s governance, enforcement and scholarship structure.
While expected for weeks now, the vote is a historic moment, a groundbreaking and seismic shift for an organization that has, for decades, fought against direct athlete pay despite the billions earned from its major football and men’s basketball powers. The result of nine months of negotiations with plaintiff lawyers, NCAA president Charlie Baker and conference commissioners usher into the industry a new age that they hope brings stability to the current unruly recruiting landscape.
Caught in a purgatory between amateurism and professionalism, major college sports is springing forward — though not by its own volition. Begrudgingly forced into this semi-professional world by state laws and the court system, the industry still clings to a shred of amateurism, as the new model is expected to still prohibit pay-for-play and booster payments.
However, college leaders believe the agreement staves off future legal challenges, binds at least for another decade the power leagues with the NCAA, and brings more regulation to the recruiting environment.
“This would be the biggest change in the history of college sports. Period,” said Gabe Feldman, a sports law professor at Tulane and leading voice in NCAA litigation matters. “There have been significant changes and incremental changes. The NIL era has opened a lot of doors, but to have athletes share revenue with the schools would be not only monumental but would be contrary to what the NCAA has espoused for a century.”
What the new model means for athletes and how much it'll cost schools
All five power conference presidential boards — the Big Ten, SEC, Pac-12, Big 12 and ACC — voted in favor of the settlement this week. The Pac-12, despite its near dissolution, voted as originally structured. The league provided the final vote Thursday evening on a landmark day.
However, a finalization of the settlement may not happen for many months. The agreement will need approval from a judge and is available for objections from individual plaintiffs — at least a five-month haul, according to experts.
However, within 14 months, at the start of the 2025 fall semester, the industry’s new model is expected to be implemented permitting schools — but not requiring them — to share revenue with athletes up to a certain quasi-salary cap.
The revenue-sharing deals with athletes will be classified as NIL agreements, with schools providing funds for the use and broadcast of a players’ name, image and likeness — a concept at the heart of the House case. Other non-NIL forms of payments are an option.
Though plenty of questions linger around this new system, institutions will be permitted to share with athletes as much as $22 million per year. That figure, still very much in flux, was derived from 22% of an average of power conference revenues. The cap includes exceptions as a combined $5 million in Alston-related money and additional scholarships can be counted toward the total.
A new model is expected to eliminate scholarship restrictions while implementing roster limits, a move to avoid more legal fights but one that could cost schools millions more in additional financial aid amid a hotly recruiting landscape.
At the end of it all is a steep price tag — $200-$300 million per school over the 10-year settlement agreement, or about $15 billion among all power schools. That figure assumes a school meets the revenue-distribution cap annually and expands scholarships by at least $3-5 million.
For many school administrators, sticker shock exists as they dig for extra cash in unusual ways, such as tapping into private equity and capital. A $30 million annual price tag coupled with $20 million in total scholarships is about 40-45% of the average athletic department budget of public schools in the ACC, Big Ten, SEC and Big 12.
However, without a settlement, college leaders risk another loss in court, a $20 billion damages tab and bankruptcy, according to documents obtained by Yahoo Sports.
Aside from the new financials, there are other changes coming.
Enforcement of rules isn't going away
The settlement-related model is expected to have a new enforcement arm and governance structure for, at least, the power conference schools, allowing them to create and enforce their own rules. Finalization around those details may be months away.
For administrators, the enforcement situation is a key piece. The settlement does not eliminate booster-led collectives, but incentivizes schools to bring them within the university’s athletic department, mostly through a stronger enforcement entity — one that potentially operates outside of the NCAA and gains teeth through the settlement itself.
As part of the settlement, the judge is expected to “reaffirm” existing NCAA compensation rules, specifically those that prohibit booster payments for deals that are not “true NIL,” according to a legal document summarizing the agreement. However, few details on the enforcement entity have been shared.
The settlement is expected to also provide what documents term a “release” of antitrust compensation claims from current, former and future athletes for 10 years as part of a “substitution” system for new plaintiffs. In a story at Yahoo Sports last week, such a concept was cited by plaintiff attorney Steve Berman, who said the settlement features a built-in element by which each new class of athletes can opt into the revenue-sharing structure.
The settlement isn’t perfect. It does not protect the NCAA and conference from future lawsuits brought by state attorneys general, does not preempt state NIL or revenue-sharing laws and offers no real ruling on Title IX’s application in such a compensation model.
Title IX “remains at the campus level to be applied,” the document notes — a situation that could lead to schools circumventing the federal law by continuously using outside third parties to compensate athletes.
Jeffrey Kessler, another plaintiff attorney in the case, believes the Title IX issue will eventually be resolved in the courtroom.
“The courts will decide,” he told Yahoo Sports. “It doesn’t impact us. If we have a settlement, we’ll negotiate a system in which athletes will be compensated. The degree in which Title IX applies will be determined [by the courts].”
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美國犯罪率普遍下降 -- Alex Gangitano
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Why homicide rates are falling across the country
Alex Gangitano, 04/21/24
Homicides are falling across the U.S. And that shift could impact the role crime — often a top voter concern — plays as an issue in November’s election.
But it is a phenomenon for which experts don’t have a clear explanation.
Some say homicide peaks come and go in cycles, some say policing improved after the COVID-19 pandemic, and some attribute it to the evolving national conversation about how to handle crime.
A data analysis released last week shows that the number of homicides in cities like Boston, Philadelphia, Washington, D.C., and Chicago, are dropping.
While many major cities, especially those run by Democrats with liberal-leaning policies and populations, have received backlash from Republicans for being inundated with violent crime, the new data paints a picture of an improving situation.
Experts, though, aren’t agreed on exactly why the number of homicides has fallen so far, so fast.
Boston saw the sharpest decline from 2023 to 2024, with homicides dropping by 82 percent. In Philadelphia, homicides dropped by 37 percent; in Dallas, homicides dropped by 27 percent; and in Chicago, homicides dropped by 6 percent, according to estimates from city police department reports compiled by AH Datalytics.
Jeffrey Fagan, professor of law and epidemiology at Columbia University, attributes the improvements to a typical crime cycle.
“I think there’s something natural in this cyclical nature of homicide and violence. One of the distinguishing features of what happened in the most recent period was that it had to do with murder more so than with other violent crimes. Other violent crimes rose but not nearly to the same extent as murder,” he said. “It’s likely to happen again, we just don’t understand the circumstances when these externalities will create the social and economic conditions for homicide rates to arise again.”
Fagan outlined other cycles, like in the 1960s when homicides started rising and peaked by 1972, then fell sharply. And in the late 1970s, when they took off again to peak in 1981 and then crash. And in the late 1980s, homicide rates skyrocketed and peaked in 1991 before crashing again.
“So, what’s the common denominator other than the fact that there’s this recurring cycle of peaks, crashes, peaks, crashes, peaks, crashes? There’s something natural about these episodes in that they follow an epidemic pattern. Any epidemiologist will tell you that it looks like any other disease epidemic,” he said.
Alex Piquero, former director of the Bureau of Justice Statistics under President Biden, outlined the factors he argues caused the spike in homicides: Community prevention programs were put on hold during the COVID-19 pandemic, and law enforcement pulled back due to the 2020 murder of George Floyd by a Minneapolis police officer and because of pandemic staffing issues.
Piquero, a professor of sociology and criminology at the University of Miami, said those conditions have been reset. “Their staffing levels are going up, police are around the community more, they’re targeting violent places and violent people using appropriate statistical methodology.”
Piquero looks at crime as a local level issue and noted it’s hard to tell yet if the funding from the Department of Justice (DOJ) under the Biden administration to combat crime is helping.
Fagan agreed, noting that homicides peak or crash “regardless of what criminal justice or public health policies are in place.”
Andrea Headley, a criminal justice policy expert at Georgetown University’s McCourt School of Public Policy, argued that investments from the federal government, whether from the bipartisan gun safety act or the American Rescue Plan, have made an impact.
Biden signed the American Rescue Plan into law in 2021, and it provided $10 billion for public safety. The bipartisan gun safety law was signed in 2022, enhancing background checks for purchasers younger than 21 and funding red flag laws to keep guns out of the hands of people deemed to be a threat to themselves or others.
“We see funding for law enforcement that happened,” Headley said. “We see, which I think probably is arguably more important, is the funding and the support structures for community violence interventions, wraparound social support services, but also the investments in job programs and mentoring. Things that we know typically are correlates of violent crime. And, kind of this targeted approach of taking money from the federal level and investing it in local communities.”
She noted the holistic approach isn’t new, but the national conversation about it is new — it was launched when the federal government provided that support.
“I think that kind of wraparound strategy of, we’re investing in community safety from all of these angles and in a way that is unprecedented is really powerful in terms of what we’ve been seeing with some of the declines, particularly last year,” she said.
The data comes in an election year, when crime is top of mind for many Americans. Both the Biden and Trump’s campaigns have blamed the other for previous spikes in crime.
The Biden camp argues that the president stands with law enforcement, including billions in funding, while Trump has called for federal law enforcement agencies to be defunded.
“By standing with law enforcement and against Republican officials’ efforts to defund the police, Joe Biden reversed the spike in violent crime he inherited from his predecessor and delivered the lowest crime rates in almost 50 years,” White House spokesperson Andrew Bates said.
Trump, meanwhile, called for the U.S. to “get back to law and order” and said something with crime prevention is “not working” after attending the funeral last month of New York police officer Jonathan Diller, who was killed on duty. The Trump campaign did not respond to a request for comment on the dropping homicide rate.
Republicans have also equated crime with Biden’s immigration policies, especially after the killing earlier this year of Georgia student Laken Riley.
Experts, though, push back on that notion.
“It is established that immigrants do not commit more crime than native born Americans, period, period, period, period, that’s been replicated over and over again,” Piquero said.
Republicans also often use Washington as an example of a city with violent crime, pointing to stories of carjackings or other crimes.
Washington last year had its highest number of homicides since 1997 and double the amount of carjackings compared to a year prior. In new data from D.C. police, homicides are down by 27 percent in the nation’s capital compared to this time last year.
Headley said the slower pace of improvements in D.C. could be attributed to the unique structure of the city, considering it is not a state and has a disjointed government structure.
“In terms of why, we could speculate about why the decline hasn’t been as quick or sharp compared to other cities, I think D.C. is unique because of the way in which there’s different levels of jurisdictions,” she said.
Fagan added that the city has extremes of wealth and poverty “that create susceptibility to conflict and violence.”
Another argument about crime is the economy, and if the economy is improving, the crime rate will improve. Biden has worked to combat inflation and seen improvements in his polling about his handling of the economy.
“That argument doesn’t hold across crime types. If a great economy leads to lower crime, that doesn’t affect the kid who put up a gun and he’s 14 years old and [couldn’t] care less about a job,” said Piquero. “So, a lot of crime is very unplanned, it’s situational.”
For the latest news, weather, sports, and streaming video, head to The Hill.
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