Below is my column on the completion of the testimony of Stormy Daniels and the start of the testimony of Michael Cohen. With a dubious legal theory, the testimony has only magnified the criticism of the prosecution as parading sensational rather than material evidence before the jury and the public. Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg is losing even CNN hosts and legal analysts. Fareed Zakaria noted “I doubt the New York indictment would have been brought against a defendant whose name was not Donald Trump” Elie Honig has observed that, if brought in a less Democratic district, “I would say…

Below is an expanded version of my New York Post column on the appearance of Michael Cohen Monday in the Manhattan prosecution of former President Donald Trump. His testimony will not be for the intestinally weak or ethically strong viewers. It has all the draw of a Nascar race on a rainy day. Here is the column: Michael Cohen is to criminal justice what car crashes are to Nascar: few want to admit it, but he is the perverse draw for the wreck-obsessed. The difference is that Cohen was already a rolling smoking wreck when he pulled up to the…

Below is an expanded version of my New York Post column on the appearance of Michael Cohen Monday in the Manhattan prosecution of former President Donald Trump. His testimony will not be for the intestinally weak or ethically strong viewers. It has all the draw of a Nascar race on a rainy day. Here is the column: Michael Cohen is to criminal justice what car crashes are to Nascar: few want to admit it, but he is the perverse draw for the wreck-obsessed. The difference is that Cohen was already a rolling smoking wreck when he pulled up to the…

For those of us who have criticized the cancel culture in higher education for years, the attacks and shunning have been unrelenting. The media has played a role in that culture and none more prominently than the New York Times. Recently, however, the mob came for liberal professors and media who have remained silent for years as conservatives and others were targeted on campus. Suddenly, there is a new interest in free speech and academic freedom, including by the Times editors who blamed cancel culture for the recent demonstrations and disruptions on campus. Until good liberals were targeted on campus,…

We have been following universities as they cave to protester demands from elaborate settlement deals at Northwestern to the cancelation of commencement at Columbia and USC. Now both Xavier University of Louisiana and the University of Vermont have yielded to expected protests and rescinded invitations to United Nations Ambassador Linda Thomas-Greenfield. Both schools admitted that they were worried about anti-Israel protests. Xavier President Dr. Reynold Verret sent out a letter explaining that “the vast majority of students want to be able to enjoy a commencement ceremony free of disruptions.” So, once again, a university faced with a cancel campaign has…

(MSNBC/via YouTube) The firm of former Clinton campaign general counsel Marc Elias has lost another election case in a spectacular fashion. The Chief Judge of the Western District of Wisconsin, James Peterson (an Obama appointee), did not just reject but ridiculed the Elias Law Group challenge to a witness requirement for absentee voting. Elias have been previously sanctioned in court and accused of lying in the Steele dossier scandal by journalists and others. U.S. District Judge James Peterson ruled against the lawsuit brought by the Elias Law Group, arguing that the witness requirement violated the Voting Rights Act of 1965…

There has been much talk about the decision of Judge Juan Merchan not to recuse himself from the Trump trial in Manhattan. I do believe that Merchan should have recused himself but I admit that this can be a difficult question. I wanted to address this question since it continues to be raised by the former president and others in the controversial trial. Notably, many insisting that Merchan not recuse himself previously called for Justice Clarence Thomas to recuse himself from any Trump-related cases due to his wife’s work for the GOP and Trump. Conversely, many who defended Thomas (including…

“I gave up shame years ago.” Those words from actor John Lithgow appear to have been taken to heart by Hillary Clinton who has severed any sense of self-awareness or shame in her public comments. Lithgow, who played Bill Clinton in Broadway production of Hillary and Clinton, appears to have inspired the subject of his play. In a recent interview, Hillary Clinton heralded the prosecution of former president Donald Trump in Manhattan as “election interference” by keeping “relevant information” from voters before an election. For those of us who criticized Clinton for the funding of the infamous Steele dossier, it was…

While pundits, politicians and the press have long expressed outrage over attacks on judges by former President Donald Trump, many are now attacking any judge who delays any trial of Trump before the election. Democrats have accused Judge Aileen Cannon of being politically compromised, if not conspiratorial, in her delay of the Florida trial over the mishandling of classified documents. Yet, there is ample reason for the delay that many of us anticipated in this type of case when it was filed. For months, many of us have said that we doubt that this type of trial could be held…

Fox is reporting that Michael Cohen was back on TikTok last night using the Trump trial to troll for dollars. Cohen reportedly appeared in a teeshirt showing Trump in an orange jumpsuit and asked for more followers. He also reportedly announced his candidacy for Congress, which would allow him to take one of the seemingly few oaths that the serial perjurer has not violated. Who would have thought that District Attorney Alvin Bragg calling a porn star to the stand would be the moral high ground for key witnesses.  Next could be a disbarred, convicted perjurer who is still seeking…