Free Republic

Former Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had such expensive tastes that he demanded gifts in the form of cigars to dip into Cointreau liqueur, a Jerusalem court heard today. Netanyahu is undergoing a blockbuster corruption trial on charges of fraud and breach of trust for allegedly accepting luxury gifts from billionaires Arnon Milchan and James Packer worth hundreds of thousands of pounds, advancing the former's various interests in return. An aide to the two billionaires testified that she had been ordered to buy cigars and Cointreau - among other items - to satiate the former prime minister and his wife...

Up until Friday, the Kyle Rittenhouse trial was very clear: Easily understood videos and witness testimony (including testimony from the prosecution witnesses) showed that Kyle, despite trying hard to avoid conflict, was attacked by a crazed child rapist, whom Kyle shot as the rapist was grabbing Kyle’s gun, at which point a mob went after Kyle. He then shot and killed a domestic abuser trying to bash his head in with a skateboard, and shot and wounded a felon aiming a loaded, illegal gun at his head. On Thursday, however, the court allowed prosecutors to enter into evidence a fuzzy...

Washington, DC (CNN)The United States Capitol Police (USCP) announced that disciplinary action has been recommended in six cases against officers following internal investigations into the January 6 attack on the US Capitol. Violations sustained include three cases for conduct unbecoming, one for failure to comply with directives, one for improper remarks, and one for improper dissemination of information, according to a USCP statement released Saturday. The statement did not specify if the six cases involved six separate officers nor did it name any of them. CNN has reached out to the USCP for clarification.... ...The USCP's Office of Professional Responsibility...

Combat isn’t black and white -- I know, I’ve lived it. When it was announced over the weekend by the New York Times that President Trump is preparing to pardon multiple veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan who have been wrongfully convicted or charged with war crimes, a firestorm of opinions and accusations began to fly. Salon described President Trump’s decision to pardon veterans as taking “imperial overreach to a new level;” The Washington Post’s Editorial Board said “such pardons would send a message of disrespect for the laws of war;” and The New Yorker published an interview with Yale Philosophy Professor Scott Shapiro who argued that pardoning military veterans...

This summer, the Supreme Court of the United States, in an act that has gained wide praised for its fairness, decided that Gov. Bob McDonnell had been wrongly convicted. He had broken no law and the Court was rightly concerned that if anti-corruption laws were applied so broadly, it would have the effect of deterring good people from running for public office. The worst example of such egregious prosecution was the railroading of an innocent city commissioner, Keith Wasserstrom. He was a pillar of his community who had stood up to local party bosses and paid a heavy price. What...

A drug case involving an arrest made by the Ferguson police officer who killed an unarmed 18-year-old in a separate incident is on hold while a grand jury reviews the shooting. A judge approved a request by prosecutors Monday to send the drug case involving the arrest by officer Darren Wilson to a St. Louis County grand jury. But a spokesman for Prosecuting Attorney Robert McCulloch later said that the case is "on hold" until Wilson's status is resolved. Spokesman Ed Magee called the move standard procedure in cases where police officers are not immediately available to testify in court....

On Monday afternoon, the US Department of Justice appealed to civil rights groups and the general public across the country for “tips” on George Zimmerman in their pursuit of potential federal civil rights charges against the just-acquitted defendant in the Trayvon Martin killing. The DOJ actually went so far as to set up an e-mail address to allow such tips: Sanford.florida@usdoj.gov. The email address is slated to go operational by the end of the week.

The U.S. Department of Transportation (DOT) has dropped its requirement for "stimulus" project propaganda signage, according to a communiqué from the department’s inspector general. As of July 15 the policy changed, the I.G. says, and signs and plaques promoting the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) at jobsites and on things like "stimulus"-funded railroad cars were “strongly encouraged” in lieu of the mandate. Sounds like a Capone line.