Mark your calendars: Today we have witnessed the first major political arrest in Poland since 1989. A prominent government critic, a lawyer, has been taken into custody on dubious charges, to do with business transactions a decade ago. Police are now searching his house.
The arrest of Roman Giertych represents another blow against the rule of law in Poland. For background - I wrote about the harassment of Poland's independent judges here:
Giertych was the lawyer for an Austrian businessman who accused the ruling party's leader, Jaroslaw Kaczynski, of defrauding him, and who also leaked embarassing tapes of Kaczynski talking about his business interests dw.com/en/kaczynski-t…
Kaczynski has now made himself deputy prime minister, and has put himself in charge of Poland's security services, among other things. This appears to be his first big decision. Giertych was due to present more evidence embarrassing to the government in another case tomorrow.
Giertych himself believes this is happening in order to distract attention from the catastrophic condition of Polish hospitals and the sharp rise in the number of coronavirus cases
To be clear: Giertych's clients include Donald Tusk, @sikorskiradek and many other political figures in Poland. The search of his home and office may be a search for political information.
Apparently Giertych lost consciousness and has been taken to hospital. His daughter says he was perfectly healthy five minutes earlier
Good morning! 24 days to go until the election - which means 24 days to think about how you can help make sure it is free and fair, and what you will do if it isn't. I wrote down some ideas here, will attach some to this email and add a few more: theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/…
Vote. Here are the rules, in all 50 states, if you have any doubts:
Since I wrote this, Trump had himself photographed "working": signing a blank piece of paper, with a binder photoshopped in afterwards to make it seem more serious. He can't even lie competently. theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/…
Do a thought experiment: if Biden were sick, what would happen? Here's my guess: Trump would be openly gloating, Republicans would be loudly celebrating, their campaigns would put out ads trying to raise money on the back of his illness.
This detail: "In 2017, the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association paid at least $397,602 to the Washington hotel...during its four-day World Summit in Defense of Persecuted Christians."
How does $400k spent at a Trump hotel benefit persecuted Christians? nytimes.com/interactive/20…
here's another one: "Together, nine Trump entities have written off at least $95,464 paid to a favorite hair and makeup artist of Ivanka Trump." It can't be easy to rack up nearly $100k in hair and makeup bills...
and another: "$1.9 million" plus "$259,684" used to pay for lawyers defending Don Jr during the Russia investigation and Trump during the investigation into his crooked charity were counted as... "business expenses"
If the vote is close, Donald Trump could easily throw the election into chaos and subvert the result. This is far more likely, writes @bartongellman, than anyone yet realizes theatlantic.com/magazine/archi…
"Legal teams on both sides are planning for simultaneous litigation, on the scale of Florida during the 2000 election, in multiple battleground states."
"With Trump we must also ask: What might a ruthless incumbent do that has never been tried before?"
19 years ago today, if you had told me that this cynical grifter would be president and Rudy Giuliani would be working on behalf of a Russian intelligence officer - I wouldn't have believed you.