[link removed]

In this mailing:
* Bruce Bawer: Norway's Top Cop Seems Baffled by Free Speech - but Not by the Inviolability of the Koran
* Benjamin Weingarten: Important New Book by Alan Dershowitz Calls for Equality and Fairness in the Justice System


** Norway's Top Cop Seems Baffled by Free Speech - but Not by the Inviolability of the Koran ([link removed])
------------------------------------------------------------

by Bruce Bawer • December 4, 2019 at 5:00 am
[link removed] [link removed] [link removed] [link removed]
+Seems+Baffled+by+Free+Speech+-+but+Not+by+the+Inviolability+of+the+Koran [link removed] [link removed]
* Norwegian police chief Marie Benedicte Bjørnland is unable to rid from her mind the certainty that mistreating a copy of the Koran is wrong and that she and her fellow flatfoots should, under some statute or other, have the power to do something about it. In short, for the Norwegian police, the Koran is, in a way, as holy as it is for Muslims.
* Once again, one was reminded of the cartoon crisis, when the Norwegian diplomatic corps saw it as urgent to apologize to authoritarian governments for whatever is left in Norway of individual liberty.
* A teacher at the school explained that she had "made a conscious decision not to buy napkins with 'Merry Christmas' written on them" or to use a red tablecloth or red tree ornaments because "certain religions are very sensitive" and care needs to be taken "not to offend anyone."
* The Norwegian government has recently spent well over $100,000 to convert churches in Stavanger and Skien into mosques and is kicking in a huge sum of taxpayer money for the construction of a mega-mosque in Bergen with, according to journalist and political activist Hege Storhaug, "open ties to extremism."

Norway's police chief is unable to rid from her mind the certainty that mistreating a copy of the Koran is wrong and that she and her fellow flatfoots should have the power to do something about it. (Images source: iStock)

Recently I wrote here about how, on November 16, the group Stop Islamization of Norway (Stopp Islamisering av Norge – SIAN) set fire to a copy of the Koran in a public square in Kristiansand, only to have the fire doused pronto by a group of 30 or more police officers. It later emerged that they were under secret orders from the chief of the Norwegian police, Marie Benedicte Bjørnland, not just to put out any such fire but to prevent SIAN members from committing any such act.

Bjørnland defended her orders by citing the so-called "racism clause" of Norway's criminal law, and the Minister of Justice, Jøran Kallmyr, stood behind her, making the baffling statement that while burning a Koran was not illegal, it could (depending on how you translated his words) "become" or "morph into" a crime.

Continue Reading Article ([link removed])


** Important New Book by Alan Dershowitz Calls for Equality and Fairness in the Justice System ([link removed])
------------------------------------------------------------

by Benjamin Weingarten • December 4, 2019 at 4:00 am
[link removed] [link removed] [link removed] [link removed]
title=Important+New+Book+by+Alan+Dershowitz+Calls+for+Equality+and+Fairness+in+the+Justice+System [link removed] [link removed]
* "The atmosphere changed dramatically. Evidence was no longer important. It was the accusation that mattered, as well as the identities of the accuser and accused. The presumption shifted from innocence to guilt. For a man to call a false accuser a liar became a political sin, even if the accused had hard evidence of the accuser's lies, as I did." — Alan M. Dershowitz, in his new book, Guilt by Accusation.
* What is indisputable are the broader implications his book raises about injustices in our justice system.
* "Currently, lawyers, clients, and witnesses can make defamatory statements in public court filings and depositions without fear of a civil suit or a perjury prosecution.... I could not sue them, because their allegations were contained in a court filing, and were thus immune from a defamation suit. Even more absurdly, by denying Giuffre's allegations and saying they were lies, I subjected myself to a defamation suit." — Alan M. Dershowitz, in his new book, Guilt by Accusation
* Independent of, and more broadly than, Professor Dershowitz's own case -- in which he asserts that the accused often has little recourse -- Dershowitz highlights major deficiencies in our legal system. Namely..., that there are no "consequences for those who file accusations with no offer to prove them and no legal responsibility if they are categorically -- and disprovably -- false."
* Professor Dershowitz's book is a plea for reforms in our justice system to treat both the accused and the accuser fairly, and for the court of public opinion to do the same.

Alan Dershowitz. (Photo by John Lamparski/Getty Images for Hulu)

Power corrupts, as Lord Acton's saying goes, and absolute power corrupts absolutely. History teaches us that the desire to bring down the powerful can also corrupt, and the absolute desire to bring down the powerful can corrupt absolutely.

This reality was brought into stark relief during the gripping confirmation hearings of Justice Brett Kavanaugh. The cynical political desires of those who sought to scuttle his nomination to the Supreme Court on the basis of wholly uncorroborated allegations (almost assuredly as a cover for their disdain for his jurisprudence, judicial philosophy and the president who nominated him) did not, as was quickly exposed, actually have a case; they seemed, rather, to be trying to ride convenient cultural reckonings. Their manifestations in law, and American life more broadly, are the subject of Alan Dershowitz's new book, Guilt by Accusation, on which more momentarily.

Continue Reading Article ([link removed])

============================================================
** Facebook ([link removed])
** Twitter ([link removed])
** RSS ([link removed])
** Donate ([link removed])
Copyright © Gatestone Institute, All rights reserved.

You are subscribed to this list as [email protected]

You can change how you receive these emails:
** Update your subscription preferences ([link removed])
or ** Unsubscribe from this list ([link removed])

** Gatestone Institute ([link removed])

14 East 60 St., Suite 705, New York, NY 10022