Lawyers From The United States

"First elected to represent Detroit in 1965, Conyers is now the longest-serving African-American. For 50 years he has recognized the big picture and worked with activists inside and outside the halls of Congress to push for big systemic change, like ending illegal wars and achieving full employment and universal healthcare... At a January 7 tribute party co-hosted by 20 Washington, DC-based progressive groups, Conyers said, “Martin Luther King has shaped me in so many ways. Jobs, justice, and peace—it’s not hard to put a philosophy of that kind into political action. And the struggle is only beginning.” In one of his numerous successful political actions, Conyers introduced the first bill to make Martin Luther King Jr.’s birthday a national holiday... Conyers has been equally bold on foreign policy issues. A Korean War veteran, Conyers became a prominent critic of the Vietnam War and later founded the Out of Afghanistan and Out of Iraq caucuses in Congress, working hand in hand with the peace movement. For social change activists, Conyers has been our progressive pole in Congress. On health care, he laid out the strong position on a single payer system that would deliver quality health care for everyone, and he... helped move the overall national conversation in a much more progressive direction."

"Whereas John Conyers, Jr., paid particular attention to advocating for the Detroit area... was found the most effective Democratic member of the House of Representatives in a 2013 joint study by the University of Virginia and Vanderbilt University; and"

"Whereas John Conyers, Jr., over the course of his legislative career, was responsible for more than 100 bills, amendments, and resolutions being enacted, including 57 on which he was the overall lead sponsor, and an additional 56 that he managed or was the lead Democratic sponsor;...led many notable legislative efforts, including the Martin Luther King Holiday Act, reauthorizations of the Voting Rights Act, reauthorizations of the Violence Against Women Act, the Hate Crimes Prevention Act, the Pattern and Practice Enforcement Act, the USA Freedom Act, the Alcoholic Beverage Labeling Act, the Fair Sentencing Act, the National Voter Registration Act of 1993 (commonly known as the Motor Voter Act), and the Innocence Protection Act;"

"Whereas John Conyers, Jr., is recognized as a champion of civil rights and civil liberties, receiving numerous honors, including the NAACP Spingarn Medal and the Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights Hubert H. Humphrey Award: Now, therefore, be it That the House of Representatives— (1)honors retired Representative John Conyers, Jr., on the occasion of his 90th birthday; and (2)extends congratulations and best wishes from the House of Representatives to Representative Conyers in celebration of a distinguished legislative career."

"The idea to memorialize [Martin Luther] King's birth was raised the same year he died (1968), by Congressman John Conyers, Jr., a Michigan Democrat. It faced immediate resistance. The economic cost of a day off work was cited by some; a Republican committee said that "the establishment of a public holiday to honor a private citizen would be contrary to our country's long-standing tradition.""

"I’m not here to tell you my troubles with the administration or — I’m happy to be on the program, because I’ve already read 96 percent of the book, and we’re investigating, but for me to start telling you what might be available and what the problems are and what the challenges are going to be, I think, is very unprofessional in an investigation of this seriousness... It’s under investigation and consideration right now. But the importance of this discussion today is critical not only to the committees — there are four committees, and how they relate to each other will come forward very shortly — but there is also the question of the media, the Fourth Estate, the press. This is now public information that, it seems to me, shouldn’t be great breaking news over a progressive news program, but this has to be investigated by the rest of the media, unless they consider this to be irrelevant or too late, or whatever reasons are, that they’re coerced or afraid themselves, too timid... I consider the relationship of the committees on the subject matter, the responsibility of the media, and the American people being brought into this discussion as the citizens, that in a representative democracy, that’s what all of us are supposed to be working on."

"The push to celebrate Martin Luther King with a national holiday became a political movement in itself... In 1982, [Stevie] Wonder, together with King's widow Coretta Scott King, presented Congress with the largest petition in favor of an issue in U.S. history, with six million signatures supporting the national holiday. Conyers had continued to raise the bill at every Congress since 1968, and it eventually passed in a 338 to 90 vote in 1983. President Ronald Reagan finally signed off on the bill in November that year, despite having previously spoken out against the holiday."

"It’s a combination of things that are happening now, Amy, that make it clear to more and more members of Congress that you can’t keep a straight face on all of this incredible indebtedness, talk about all the money that we’ve shoveled out to Wall Street, and credit isn’t loosening up, unemployment is still at all-time highs. We’re projected in Detroit to have more foreclosures on homes than last year. And so, we’ve got to turn with — especially with all the shouts about being fiscally conservative, the way to climb out of this is to reduce the obligations of our government. Here we are in hundreds of billions of dollars of war debt, and our president is saying we now have to have an emergency funding, which is merely another way of saying we’re going to specially fund the Afghanistan surge. It makes no sense. And I think militarily, it is not logical. And, of course, morally, I can’t remember anything like this since Korea and Vietnam..."

"As an initial matter, there is no doubt that WikiLeaks is in an unpopular position right now. Many feel their publication was offensive. But unpopularity is not a crime, and publishing offensive information isn't either. And the repeated calls from Members of Congress, the government, journalists, and other experts crying out for criminal prosecutions or other extreme measures cause me some consternation."

"Indeed, when everyone in this town is joined together calling for someone's head, it is a pretty sure sign that we might want to slow down and take a closer look... I find myself agreeing with those who think Assange is being unduly vilified. I certainly do not support or like his disclosure of secrets... But as all the handwringing over the 1917 Espionage Act shows, it is not obvious what law he has violated."

"Our country was founded on the belief that speech is sacrosanct, and that the answer to bad speech is not censorship or prosecution, but more speech. And so whatever one thinks about this controversy, it is clear that prosecuting WikiLeaks would raise the most fundamental questions about freedom of speech about who is a journalist and about what the public can know about the actions of their own government."

"Today the Committee will consider the WikiLeaks matter. The case is complicated, obviously. It involves possible questions of national security, and no doubt important subjects of international relations, and war and peace. But fundamentally, the Brennan observation should be instructive."

"It’s become clear that this struggle isn’t over. Much of the violence is gone, which provoked and embarrassed so many people, but we’re still trying to make sure that we aren’t losing rights. Traditional civil rights groups [like] the NAACP [and] the ACLU are making sure we continue this and we don’t let the Act be treated as a bit of unsavory history in that past."

"We’re calling for an end to this metadata of phone numbers of everybody... without any regard for a criminal investigation going on or anything else... I think that he [Edward Snowden] was overzealous... He has clearly broken some laws, for which they—now the government wants to prosecute him for. But inadvertently, he has revealed to us a whole area of secrecy and activity with telephone collections and other things that are now being revealed that would not have been revealed otherwise... of course it [NSA’s bulk collection of metadata] would be illegal."

"We welcome everyone here to the hearing. In the Texas v. Johnson case in 1989, the Supreme Court set forth one of the fundamental principles of our democracy. That is, that if there is a bedrock principle underlying the First Amendment, it is that the government may not prohibit the expression of an idea simply because society finds the idea itself offensive or disagreeable. That was Justice William Brennan."

"Many people don’t remember how violent and dangerous it was in the South at that time. This bill was the culmination of a long list of incidents going on all over America, particularly in the South... Many people, if not most people in the country, were tired of and embarrassed by the violence that accompanied resistance to ending segregation. ... There were two schools of thought in American politics during that time. There were those who were not willing to throw in the towel and agree that we were coming into a new era. The Southern senators—who were then Democrats—were going to resist to the bitter end bringing about any kind of social equality, and they meant it... This [division] wasn’t over because we passed the Civil Rights Act of 1964. These were very turbulent times... D.C. itself was still in the process of fully desegregating. It was very clear to a lot of people that this was something that had to change... couldn’t go on any longer. But it also meant that there were a large number of people that weren’t for the change."

"Indeed, while there's agreement that sometimes secrecy is necessary, the real problem today is not too little secrecy, but too much secrecy... Furthermore, we are too quick to accept government claims that risk the national security..."

"Over 4 million Africans and their descendants were enslaved in the United States and its colonies from 1619 to 1865, and as a result, the United States was able to begin its grand place as the most prosperous country in the free world... It is un-controverted that African slaves were not compensated for their labor. More unclear however, is what the effects and remnants of this relationship have had on African-Americans and our nation from the time of emancipation through today..."

"In January of 1989, I first introduced the bill H.R. 40, Commission to Study Reparation Proposals for African Americans Act. I have re-introduced HR 40 every Congress since 1989, and will continue to do so until it's passed into law... One of the biggest challenges in discussing the issue of reparations in a political context is deciding how to have a national discussion without allowing the issue to polarize our party or our nation. The approach that I have advocated for over a decade has been for the federal government to undertake an official study of the impact of slavery on the social, political and economic life of our nation."

"I chose the number of the bill, 40, as a symbol of the forty acres and a mule that the United States initially promised freed slaves. This unfulfilled promise and the serious devastation that slavery had on African-American lives has never been officially recognized by the United States Government."

"It is a fact that slavery flourished in the United States and constituted an immoral and inhumane deprivation of African slaves' lives, liberty and cultural heritage. As a result, millions of African Americans today continue to suffer great injustices. But reparation is a national and a global issue, which should be addressed in America and in the world. It is not limited to Black Americans in the US but is an issue for the many countries and villages in Africa, which were pilfered, and the many countries, which participated in the institution of slavery..the concept of reparations is not a foreign idea to either the U.S. government or governments throughout the world."

"Though there is historical cognition for reparations and it is a term that is fairly well known in the international body politic, the question of reparations for African Americans remains unresolved. And so, just as we've discussed the Holocaust and Japanese internment camps, and to some extent the devastation that the colonists inflicted upon the Indians, we must talk about slavery and its continued effects... Last year the Democratic Party included this issue in the platform it asks that country engage in a discussion at the federal legislative level would send an important signal to the African American community and other people of goodwill."

"Well, it’s never been clear to me that, through war, we can bring peace, especially when we’re the invaders. We’re the ones using drones. We’re causing civilian deaths to many people who would otherwise be more friendly to us. We’re creating the terrorists. This is not being lost on most of the people in the country now. Our constituents now want us out of both Afghanistan and Iraq. And what we’re doing now is forming a way to discuss this with our president in an effort to make him more comfortable with doing what most people want him to do and what we thought he was going to do in the first place — namely is to clearly disengage from the military, increase the diplomatic activity, and bring in some help in terms of food supplies, aid, and positive buildup of these countries, and to make as many friends as we can over there, rather than this ninth year of what has now become a debacle in every respect."

"My bill does four things:"

"When you have, say MSNBC, and they’ve got eight pharmaceutical advertisements an hour and you want to do a story on Bayer because their product, Yaz, has killed women between the ages of 18-35. You would think the producers would say, “This is an important story,” but unfortunately the power of money, especially in television and cooperate media is overwhelming. You can’t tell the stories. So what’s happened is, in order for people to hear these stories, sometimes this [legal thriller novels] is the only kind of vehicle they can have. They can read a good thriller and hopefully it’s going to be an entertaining thriller for them, but then they can walk away and say “Well, what did I learn?” In these books they learn an awful lot about the dysfunction of the Department of Justice. They learn how predatory the pharmaceutical industry is, they learn that everything is stacked against the whistle blower. So I think it opens some peoples’ eyes along the way... I think it’s kind of incumbent on a lawyer that’s writing about issues that they’re aware of to understand that maybe nobody else is aware of them and to try to get those stories out."

"Power is found in conviction... When I think about everything that I have spent my time doing and drill right down to why, it’s out of conviction... The reason I do this thing with the media, whether it’s MSNBC, Free Speech TV or RT Network, is because I came up kind of a victim... When you come up on the other side of the country club wall and you realize that there is no effort at all to help from that side, your reaction is to reject all that... I think I would be a pretty good golfer, but I can’t associate with that whole culture of the country club. I grew up so far on the other side that my conviction draws me to do what I do... Every profession has the good and the bad, and we certainly have our share of the bad, but most people don’t ever take the time to realize that they are victims every day. If not for the efforts of trial lawyers, they’d continue to be victims... We have safer cars and safer pharmaceuticals because of trial lawyers... We push back Wall Street when they try to steal from mom and pop’s pension programs. Without trial lawyers, there would be nobody pushing back with a progressive approach to politics... You have to believe in something. When you’re driven like that, it creates an energy that is a power."

""People in Pensacola ask me why I'm doing this... I could be on my boat in the Bahamas, smoking cigars, drinking whiskey and living in Pleasantville. But our country needs true patriots, people who will ask questions about what's going on around us. When I'm at Air America, I'm in a room of true patriots like the ones who fought for our freedom in 1776. We don't want to be part of the establishment. We don't want to be mindless, driveling fools. That's why I've taken time out of my practice to do this thing... We are not going away... I don't feel any big pressure now, like I did the first six months."

"Texas has a new law that could result in prison sentences for up to 10 years in jail for anyone who protests a new fossil fuel pipeline. I couldn’t make that up. This is just one of the many anti protest bills that states have passed... I looked at this and it was almost as if there’s this notion that if it’s fossil fuel industry, then nothing really applies constitutionally. First Amendment really doesn’t apply. You know, the right to protest, right to free speech. I don’t know how they get here. Now let me back up and say yes, there are times when the right to protest can be controlled. You can say you can protest over here. There are times when you say that, that your speech is so angry or it’s so dangerous that it can cause harm and so we can put some kind of regulator on this. But this is crazy talk. Let me add one other point. They’re calling it riot boosting. That’s the term. Again, riot boosting... we’re talking about putting people in prison for 5 years, 10 years, $100,000 fine... If we have some honest appellate courts, in the old days when we had that, this thing would be dead on arrival."

"And finally tonight, some good news... According to reports, Warren and Sanders are the only Democrats who aren’t meeting with Wall Street big wigs... they aren’t okay with the criminal activity that Wall Street engages in that’s tanked our economy...they aren't ok with bankers gambling away mom and pop pensions... with the Democratic Party being owned by the big banks..."

"Believe it or not, there are more issues than you think that unite both the left and the right and taking on Wall Street greed happens to be one of them... I’m not so sure that the Republicans really are concerned about corporate greed, but whatever has happened... we see...Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren and AOC ... they’re all out there saying, look, we need to do something about corporate greed... the way that they were involved with loans... Over the most of the 20th century... you had caps... And then all of a sudden there was deregulation. And when deregulation took place, all of this bad stuff started occurring. You know, Wall Street stole from mom and pop. The economy crashed."

"The music leading up to a fiery Hitler speech needs to sound more spooky to Mike Papantonio. Playing it over and over again in a cramped, makeshift studio on the fifth floor in his downtown Pensacola office, Papantonio wants the bells to echo more. The scary tune will lead the "Ring of Fire" radio show that Papantonio co-hosts with Robert F. Kennedy Jr. on Air America Radio. The music fittingly introduces an investigative piece about white supremacist Ron Wilson, a David Duke follower, who recently earned appointment to South Carolina's state Board of Education. The 51-year-old estimates he spends about 80 percent of his time working on producing his weekly radio show or working on growing Air America Radio, which was launched in March 2004 as an alternative to conservative-dominated AM talk radio... After earning a University of Florida journalism degree, Papantonio spent the next 25 years becoming one of the country's most respected trial lawyers. As head of mass torts at Pensacola's Levin Papantonio law firm he has handled major cases throughout the nation, including asbestos, breast implants, Fen-Phen and Florida's tobacco litigation. Then, he heard about the creation of Air America Radio. He didn't need to see a business plan, he simply believes in the product.And Air America insiders are glad he did. During the first week, Papantonio recalls a 2 a.m. meeting in New York with a handful of Air America executives where the fledgling, ...network was hours from shutting down without a quick cash infusion."

"Big Corporations promised that they would hire workers after getting a massive tax cut. But so far it looks like they’re pocketing all the money. ...Remember... the talking points, Republicans, oh, this is going to be great. Tax cuts, we’re going to hire more people. We’re going to pay them more. Now, you look... just the opposite has happened.They’re pocketing the money, giving all the money to the CEOs and laying thousands of people off. Corporations are always going to do what corporations do... you can’t teach them to play nice. It’s like... trying to convince a hyena that you shouldn’t eat a dead carcass because it’s bad... Corporations right now are eating dead carcasses all over the world, not just the country... This money, $18 million, just on Ford alone, $18 million went to the CEO because of the... tax cuts. At the same time they laid off... 7,000 people... and they made $750 million. Now that’s just Ford... There are many other companies... We all knew it was a big lie. We all knew.. the hyenas will always go after the dead carcass and the corporate hyenas are doing just that... If Trump was smart, he would say, "You know what? You can try to do that, but you’re going to be punished...""

"But how far this court, in whom the judiciary powers may in some sort be said to be concentrated, shall have power to declare the nullity of a law passed in its forms by the legislative power, without exercising the power of that branch, contrary to the plain terms of that constitution, is indeed a deep, important, and I will add, a tremendous question, the decision of which might involve consequences to which gentlemen may not have extended their ideas. I am happy in being of opinion there is no occasion to consider it upon this occasion; and still more happy in the hope that the wisdom and prudence of the legislature will prevent the disagreeable necessity of ever deciding it, by suggesting the propriety of making the principles of the Constitution the great rule to direct the spirit of their laws."

"He was a warrior. There aren’t that many warriors... He genuinely loved people and the jury saw that. When he had a client at the table, they saw that the compassion that was being projected by Fred [Levin] was real."

"Corporations understand that not every legal battle is gonna make it to the Supreme Court. In fact, most cases won’t even make it to federal court at all. That’s why corporate dark money is starting to flood local judicial races... People have to understand that these state court judges affect the environment. They affect wage and hour. They affect every aspect of what I call the dinner table issues. That’s mom and pop talking about we don’t have enough money to pay our mortgage. We don’t have enough money to pay the rent. We can’t afford food...Mom and pop care that this local judge can shut down a union, that this local judge can destroy the environment that the local judge can affect wage and hour issues.... social issues are a problem, but what mom and pop care about when you talk about issues like this, how does this affect me?"

"Pensacola-based attorney Mike Papantonio is no stranger to drug companies and the courtroom, he’s one of the most respected names in personal injury law in the country. Through his decades of experience, he’s seen a lot of serious cases, many involving deadly drugs, but said none can compare to the opioid epidemic. "I've seen some really bad ones, Fen-phen, for example, just killed hundreds of people, but it had an end. This has no end,” Papantonio said. He’s taken tobacco companies to task, but said it pales in comparison to what’s being seen with opioids. “It [tobacco] took 20 years, 30 years sometimes to kill you, this kills you tomorrow, this kills you today,” Papantonio explained... He said he doesn’t blame doctors for the prescriptions of these deadly drugs, but rather believes blame is at the hands of the pharmaceutical companies and manufacturers. He believes some of them wrongly sold-off the drugs without fully explaining the dangers of the painkillers. Now he wants to hold them accountable and the best way to do that he said is to hit them in the wallet.. He said at the end of the day it’s not about book sales, settlements or even burden on the taxpayers, but the true cost of the crisis, which is the suffering felt by the addicts and their families. “It's destroying families. When I talk to you about dependency court, there's children every day being taken away from both parents because both parents are drug addicts,” Papantonio said."

"Fans have their own quantified intangibles. They have their own adversity they're going through in their life and the team, and baseball itself, bonds with them in a unique way."

"My childhood experience and the time I spent in hospitals as a kid has helped me not only understand a lot of the roadblocks in life, but overcome come them."

"Music tugs at the heartstrings of humanity. Just like sport, it’s kind of a sibling to sport."

"The events of the past few days regarding the Cook County State’s Attorney’s handling of the Jussie Smollett case is not condoned by the IPBA, nor is it representative of the honest ethical work prosecutors provide to the citizens of the State of Illinois on a daily basis .. the State’s Attorney and her representatives have fundamentally misled the public on the law and circumstances surrounding the dismissal .. When an elected State’s Attorney recuses herself from a prosecution, Illinois law provides that the court shall appoint a special prosecutor. See 55 ILCS 5/3-9008(a-15). Typically, the special prosecutor is a neighboring State’s Attorney, the Attorney General, or the State Appellate Prosecutor. Here, the State’s Attorney kept the case within her office and thus never actually recused herself as a matter of law. .. the process employed in this case by the State’s Attorney effectively denied law enforcement agencies of legally required Notice (See 20 ILCS 2630/5.2(d)(4)) and the legal opportunity to object to the sealing of the file (See 20 ILCS 2630/5.2(d)(5)). The State’s Attorney not only declined to fight the sealing of this case in court, but then provided false information to the public regarding it. .. the State’s Attorney has claimed this arrangement is “available to all defendants” and “not a new or unusual practice.” There has even been an implication it was done in accordance with a statutory diversion program. These statements are plainly misleading and inaccurate. This action was highly unusual, not a statutory diversion program, and not in accordance with well accepted practices of State’s Attorney initiated diversionary programs. .. The actions of the Cook County State’s Attorney have fallen woefully short of this expectation. Through the repeated misleading and deceptive statements to the public on Illinois law and circumstances surrounding the Smollett dismissal, the State’s Attorney has failed in her most fundamental ethical obligations to the public. The IPBA condemns these actions."

"You have a 16-count indictment … and then within a very short period of time, the case gets dismissed by the prosecution and it gets sealed. Unusual is almost not strong enough of a word"

"I've deliberately chosen a career where I've worked with people who work on issues that deal with those who have the least among us, because I've never shaken, never been able to shake the caste that I come from"

"the crime here was a Class 4 felony, the least serious category, which also covers things like falsely pulling a fire alarm in school and “draft card mutilation.” These felonies are routinely resolved, particularly in cases involving suspects with no prior criminal record"

"Money might... indeed become a servant of humanity, transformed from a tool of oppression into a means of securing common prosperity. But first the central bank needs to become a public servant. It needs to be made a public utility, responsive to the needs of the people and the economy."

"As alarm bells sound over the advancing destruction of the environment, a variety of Green New Deall proposals have appeared in the US and Europe, along with some interesting academic debates about how to fund them. Monetary policy, normally relegated to obscure academic tomes and bureaucratic meetings behind closed doors, has suddenly taken center stage... Public development banks already have a successful track record in Europe, and their debts are not considered debts of the government. They are financed not through taxes but by the borrowers when they repay the loans. Like other banks, development banks are moneymaking institutions that not only don’t cost the government money but actually generate a profit for it."

"May 15th-19th has been designated “National Infrastructure Week” by the US Chambers of Commerce, the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE)... Their message: “It’s time to rebuild.” Ever since ASCE began issuing its “National Infrastructure Report Card” in 1998, the nation has gotten a dismal grade of D or D+. In the meantime, the estimated cost of fixing its infrastructure has gone up from $1.3 trillion to $4.6 trillion. While American politicians debate endlessly over how to finance the needed fixes and which ones to implement, the Chinese have managed to fund massive infrastructure projects all across their country, including 12,000 miles of high-speed rail built just in the last decade... A key difference between China and the US is that the Chinese government owns the majority of its banks... The US government could do that too, without raising taxes, slashing services, cutting pensions, or privatizing industries.... The federal government could set up a bank on a similar model. It has massive revenues, which it could leverage into credit for its own purposes. Since financing is typically about 50 percent of the cost of infrastructure, the government could cut infrastructure costs in half by borrowing from its own bank. Public-private partnerships are a good deal for investors but a bad deal for the public. The federal government can generate its own credit without private financial middlemen. That is how China does it, and we can to."

"Funding through the Federal Reserve may be controversial, but establishing a national public infrastructure and development bank should be a no-brainer. The real question is why we don’t already have one, like China, Germany, and other countries that are running circles around us in infrastructure development. Many European, Asian and Latin American countries have their own national development banks, as well as belonging to bilateral or multinational development institutions that are jointly owned by multiple governments. Unlike the US Federal Reserve, which considers itself “independent” of government, national development banks are wholly owned by their governments and carry out public development policies. The most profitable and efficient way for national and local governments to finance public infrastructure and development is with their own banks, as the impressive track records of KfW and other national development banks have shown... We need to resurrect that public funding engine today, not only to address the national and global crises we are facing now but for the ongoing development the country needs in order to manifest its true potential."

"The money issued by governments to finance public projects has a long and successful history dating back at least to the beginning of the 18th century, when the American colony of Pennsylvania issued a currency that was both lent and spent by the government local in the local economy. The result was a period of unprecedented prosperity achieved without inflation or taxes."

"The brief visit of then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to Libya in October 2011 was referred to by the media as a “victory lap.” “We came, we saw, he died!” she crowed in a CBS video interview on hearing of the capture and brutal murder of Libyan leader Muammar el-Qaddafi.... US-NATO intervention was allegedly undertaken on humanitarian grounds, after reports of mass atrocities; but human rights organizations questioned the claims after finding a lack of evidence.... Before 2011, Libya had achieved economic independence, with its own water, its own food, its own oil, its own money, and its own state-owned bank. It had arisen under Qaddafi from one of the poorest of countries to the richest in Africa. Education and medical treatment were free; having a home was considered a human right; and Libyans participated in an original system of local democracy. The country boasted the world’s largest irrigation system, the Great Man-made River project, which brought water from the desert to the cities and coastal areas; and Qaddafi was embarking on a program to spread this model throughout Africa. But that was before US-NATO forces bombed the irrigation system and wreaked havoc on the country."

"Of the 3,000 emails released from Hillary Clinton’s private email server in late December 2015, about a third were from her close confidante Sidney Blumenthal, the attorney who defended her husband in the Monica Lewinsky case. One of these emails, dated April 2, 2011, reads in part: Qaddafi’s government holds 143 tons of gold, and a similar amount in silver . . . . This gold was accumulated prior to the current rebellion and was intended to be used to establish a pan-African currency based on the Libyan golden Dinar. This plan was designed to provide the Francophone African Countries with an alternative to the French franc (CFA). In a “source comment,” the original declassified email adds: According to knowledgeable individuals this quantity of gold and silver is valued at more than $7 billion... Conspicuously absent is any mention of humanitarian concerns. The objectives are money, power and oil."