By Debbie Schlussel
**** UPDATE #2: He confesses to the swastika hate crimes. So, what is his religion, ethnic back ground? Why isn’t that being reported? Weapon count upped, too: SEVEN pipe bombs in his apartment. ****
**** UPDATE: Now, I’m really suspicious of Ivanov’s background (and what his religion is). The New York Post reports he is a suspect in the New York Synagogue Swastika vandalism. (Thanks to Reader Rochel for the tip.) And not only did he have more weapons than earlier reported, but he claims to have served in BOSNIA. Hello . . .?:

When cops searched his fourth-floor apartment, they found six pipe bombs, sniper rifles, a handgun, shotguns, a crossbow with arrows, silencers, bomb-making equipment and other weapons. . . .
He was questioned by the joint FBI-NYPD terrorism task force. . . .
Local residents said he would spin colorful tales about his past, including that he is of Russian and Bulgarian descent, a former army sniper who served in Bosnia.
He has been on the NYPD’s radar at least since September, when he became a suspect in a slew of hate crimes in the area that included swastikas painted on synagogues and cars.

****
The story of Ivaylo Ivanov amuses me. He’s the guy who had three pipe bombs and other weaponry (lots of guns and a crossbow) in his Brooklyn apartment. And he wore a full-body vest. We don’t yet know why. His Slavic last name certainly piques my interest. Could he be Chechnyan? Kosovar? Bosnian? You know what I’m wondering (bring it, Nazi-financed Media Matters). And why did he have multiple pipe bombs and weapons in his home? To protect his balcony greenhouse tomato garden in the middle of winter? The illegal bullet-proof vest was a . . . fashion statement?
But then there’s the reason he got caught. Early Sunday, he went to the hospital with a self-inflicted gunshot wound–he shot himself in the finger (good aim). Like several Muslim terrorists, this guy isn’t exactly Einstein. More like prime Darwin Award candidate:

Police went to Ivanov’s home to investigate after he checked himself in to Long Island College Hospital to be treated for a self-inflicted gunshot wound.

Then there’s the usual quote you hear in every one of these stories . . . where clueless neighbors say what a nice guy he was. It’s just like a former female Nazi guard in California I wrote about. Her neighbors said the same thing about her. And I’m sure Jeffrey Dahmer’s neighbors said he seemed like such a nice, quiet herbivorous vegan:

“He seems like a really nice guy, a really gentle person,” said James Robinson, 45, a resident of the same building as Ivanov, in Monday editions of the New York Times.

Yup, reeeeeally gentle.

By Debbie Schlussel
Just what constitutes a Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination?
Courts have ruled that, for example, hair and blood samples and fingerprints are not covered by the Fifth Amendment. If law enforcement properly asks for them (ie., subpeona), you have to pony up.
But now a federal magistrate (the glorified equivalent of a clinician with no special knowledge or skill to be a judge; and not appointed by the Prez or confirmed by the Senate) has ruled that your computer encryption password is, in fact, covered by the Fifth Amendment and you can refuse to give it out in exercising your right against self-incrimination. It’s being appealed to an actual federal court judge, as it should be. But it’s in U.S. District Court in the People’s Republic of Ben & Jerry a/k/a Vermont, so I expect it’ll be upheld by the judge.

While I’m not strongly for or against this ruling (I don’t like government coercion and invasion of privacy, but if it involves stopping a terrorist plot against Americans, all bets are off), I’m surprised by it, as authorities can legally obtain the contents of your computer through various means, including enlisting a techie with the ability to decode or de-encrypt encrypted files. And, in a civil suit, the contents of your computer can be obtained via discovery–if you refuse to compy, you can be fined or jailed for contempt. In my mind, that makes the ruling sort of irrelevant.
But the facts of the case are interesting. It involves a Canadian citizen and legal U.S. resident stopped by Customs and Border Protection and investigated by ICE at the border. They noted that his computer (he admitted it was his) contained files with headings strongly indicating it was child porn. But they could not get into the encrypted files.
Some experts say he gave up his Fifth Amendment rights:

“The consequence of this decision being upheld is that the government would have to find other methods to get this information,” said Marc Rotenberg, executive director of the Electronic Privacy Information Center. “But that’s as it should be. That’s what the Fifth Amendment is intended to protect.”
Mark D. Rasch, a privacy and technology expert with FTI Consulting and a former federal prosecutor, said the ruling was “dangerous” for law enforcement. “If it stands, it means that if you encrypt your documents, the government cannot force you to decrypt them,” he said. “So you’re going to see drug dealers and pedophiles encrypting their documents, secure in the knowledge that the police can’t get at them.” . . .
Orin S. Kerr, an expert in computer crime law at George Washington University, said that Boucher lost his Fifth Amendment privilege when he admitted that it was his computer and that he stored images in the encrypted part of the hard drive. “If you admit something to the government, you give up the right against self-incrimination later on,” said Kerr, a former federal prosecutor.
Lee Tien, senior staff attorney at the Electronic Frontier Foundation, a civil liberties group, said encryption is one of the few ways people can protect what they write, read and watch online. “The last line of defense really is you holding your own password,” he said. “That’s what’s at stake here.

So, what do you think? Is an e-mail account password equivalent to the right not to speak/testify, pursuant to the Fifth Amendment?
It seems to me he admitted what was on there and that it was his computer, kind of like when an attorney asks you questions, which you answer, and then it’s too late to assert the Fifth Amendment, once you’ve gone down that road.
But is it that hard to dis-encrypt something that an expert can’t do it after a few weeks? Apparently so, or I doubt this case would go as far as it has.

By Debbie Schlussel
Every year, on Martin Luther King Day, I write about how various Muslim and Arab groups (mostly dominated by Muslims) invoke the name of Martin Luther King, Jr. for their various whines about alleged oppression and trumped-up discrimination, coupled with their various hate-filled diatribes against Israel. And every year, on Martin Luther King Day, I have to remind them, that if they want to own the King legacy, they have to own it all . . . including his love for Israel as a Jewish state. And including his views that you–the haters of Israel–are, in fact, anti-Semitic.
While the oft-cited “Letter to an Anti-Zionist Friend” may be fabricated, King’s record and views on Israel are clear in his documented words and actions. As I wrote in 2005, in “Radical Islam Wishes You a Happy MLK Day“:

Dr. King Turning Over in His Grave
Over Benjamin Chavis Muhammad, Islamists Perverting His Name

King was adamantly opposed to the views of [Islamists including Imad] Hamad and ADC [American Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee]. At a 1968 Harvard appearance, King rebuked a student who attacked Israel. “When people criticize Zionists, they mean Jews. You’re talking anti-Semitism,” King said.

(Although an oft-cited “Letter to an Anti-Zionist Friend,” purportedly by King, may be fabricated, his Harvard quotes are well-documented, in Seymour Martin Lipset, “The Socialism of Fools-The Left, the Jews and Israel,” Encounter, (December 1969), p. 24.)

Then, there’s my favorite MLK-invoking “former” Islamic terrorist, FBI Award Revokee Imad Hamad, and his merry band of haters at the falsely-named American Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee (ADC).
On January 25th, Friday, all of the top federal law enforcement officials–including Islamo-pandering Michigan FBI Special Agent in Charge Andrew Arena, Michigan/Ohio Special Agent in Charge Brian Moskowitz a/k/a “Abu Moskowitz”, and U.S. Attorney Stephen Murphy III a/k/a “Abu Porno”–will be at the ADC’s Annual Martin Luther King Day Awards Banquet. Awards will be given out for an essay contest on King, which ironically does not allow Blacks to enter. The contest is only open to Arabs. So much for that thing about “content of character” versus “color of skin.” Who said that? I can’t recall.
The banquet will be hosted by Benjamin Chavis Muhammad (BCM), who is only referred to as “Dr. Ben Chavis” in ADC announcements. Why are they trying to hide his last name? Well, it might have something to do with a few facts about Mr. Muhammad:
* A convert to the Nation of Islam brand of Islam, BCM was Louis Farrakhan’s right-hand man and personally organized the 1995 “Million Man March” and 2000 “Million Family March,” at both of which Farrakhan and others spewed anti-Semitic and anti-White slurs.
* As I previously wrote in the Jerusalem Post (reprinted here), BCM was fired from the NAACP, where he was executive director, because he stole $64,000 in NAACP funds to settle a female employee’s sexual harassment suit against him. After he was fired, he blamed it on “Right-wing Jews,” though the NAACP board at the time featured all Blacks and no Jews. Muhammad never apologized for his anti-Semitic comment.
* As current chief of the Hip-Hop Summit Action Network (HSAN), recruited for the position just after his “Right Wing Jews” comment and NAACP firing by hip-hop mogul Russell Simmons, BCM endorsed a number of openly anti-Semitic candidates for office, including Cynthia McKinney and “Will Mega,” a former organizer for late Farrakhan acolyte Khalid Abdul Muhammad.
Yup, that sounds like an ideal Martin Luther King Day speaker . . . for anti-Semitic, terrorist supporting Muslims, which is what the ADC is.
That all of the top federal law enforcement officials–like the dhimmi-dhummis that they are–would fete this guy and these cretins he’s appearing with, is beyond disgusting. Even more so is the fact that the liberal-dominated Jewish establishment in Detroit won’t object to this because they’re more concerned with “outreach” and pandering to these anti-Semites and Islamists.
Hmmm . . . no wonder they none of them want to be judged by the “content of their character.”
*** E-MAIL BRIAN MOSKOWITZ and let him know what you think about his attendance at an event hosted by an open anti-Semite and bigot.

By Debbie Schlussel
As I write this, the Green Bay Packers are at home in Lambeau Field a/k/a Tundra Terrace playing the New York Giants for the right to play DebbieSchlussel.com 2007 Woman of the Year Tom Brady and his New England Patriots (coached by Bill Belicheater) in the Superbowl.
But, as someone who has spent considerable time in Packerland (I went to both Law and Business Schools at the University of Wisconsin and lived and worked in both Madison and Stevens Point, Wisconsin), I must say nothing surprises me in terms of the degree to which Packer fans a/k/a Cheeseheads get carried away. They simply need a life. When I lived and worked in Steven’s Point, for example, I knew the best time to go to the gym on Sundays was during a Packer’s game–no traffic and zero people working out = me getting to the gym quickly and getting my pick of workout machines.

Green Bay Plays “Soup Nazi” with Giants QB
Now, we’ve come to learn that a Green Bay TV station decided to pre-empt its syndicated “Seinfeld” re-runs because it heard that Giants Quarterback Eli Manning loves to watch them. It’s ironic that the Green Bay fans are acting like “Seinfeld’s” Soup Nazi: No soup, er . . . “Seinfeld” for you! And it’s just a little silly. (The station now claims it was in jest. Riiight.)
So is Green Bay’s decision to make a special street sign and rename “New York Avenue” for the day, too.
And Jerry Seinfeld isn’t taking it sitting down:

News of WLUK-TV’s decision apparently reached Jerry Seinfeld himself.
“I’m going to send Eli a complete collection of ‘Seinfeld’ DVDs and a partial collection of ‘Hogan’s Heroes’ for inspiration,” the comedian told the New York Post on Thursday.
“You think I’m going to take that sitting down?”

I know the extreme freeze and tundra-like, snow-covered conditions can make people a little crazy and limit their options. But come on. These Green Bay people need a life.
The whole thing reminds me of the silly “Freedom Fries” v. “French Fries” debate, which I’m sure was of so much consequence to your life as it was to mine.
I don’t really care who wins, but after spending several years in Wisconsin, I’ve grown very tired of the undue hero-worship of Brett Favre (and the way he and his criminal-filled family can’t even pronounce their surname correctly).
So, who will win? Predictions?

By Debbie Schlussel
None of the new releases out this weekend are too bad, but “Cloverfield” is the best of the bunch and the only one I wholeheartedly recommend. I was unable to screen the new Woody Allen flick, “Cassandra’s Dream“–out in limited release–and will have to review it later (it’s getting mostly bad reviews).
* “Cloverfield“: I really liked this tight, well-done movie that is sort of an updated, hip version of “Godzilla,” including a touching, but not chick-flickish love story. If there is one drawback, it is the jerky, shaky, constantly moving “Blair Witch Project”-style the movie in which the movie is shot, on a hand-held camera. It will give you a headache, unless you sit farther back in the theater.
Using all unknown–but still good-looking and well-acted–actors, a group of 20- or 30-something Manhattan friends are at a good-bye party for their friend, Rob (very hot actor Michael Stahl-David, one to watch). We watch the movie through the lens of a video camera that Rob’s friend, Hud, is using to film the good-bye party.

Rob is in love with his long-time friend, Beth, but they are not together and she leaves the party in strife. Soon, though, New York under attack. Buildings are blown up and it seems like there is an earthquake. Rob and his friends escape the apartment building. On the streets of Manhattan, the Statue of Liberty’s head falls right near them. This is another error in the movie–methinks the head is too small versus the real size on the real Lady Liberty. More shots of buildings being attacked are very vivid and disturbing, reminding you of 9/11.
Soon, we see what is attacking Manhattan–a giant creature that looks like a cross between a dinosaur and a bony creature from “Alien” v. “Predator.” Rob and his friends are told to evacuate Manhattan by the national guard, but Rob gets cell-phone calls from Beth that she is trapped. Rob and friends crawl through Manhattan’s subway tunnels, walk among rats, fight off giant spider-like creatures, and traverse destroyed buildings to rescue Beth and get out of Manhattan before the last military helicopter takes off and bombing of New York begins.
The movie is very short–just under an hour and twenty minutes. And it’s tight and fast-paced. There is no slack or boredom here. It’s equal parts action, adventure, romance, sci-fi, and horror.
A fun, escapist, light movie that is highly recommended, but not for kids–there’s a little blood. In case you were wondering, Cloverfield is the name of the operation to evacuate Manhattan and eradicate the giant monster and his spider spawns, but it’s not too important to the movie.
* “Mad Money“: This is basically a chick flick, with a bank robbery thrown in to make it seem kosher for the boyfriends/husbands/significant others who get dragged along for the ride.
Diane Keaton is an upper class housewife in a swanky house in a swanky neighborhood. But her husband, Ted Danson, loses his job, and they’re up to their ears in bills. She’s unqualified for any jobs and can only find work as a janitor at the Kansas City branch of the Federal Reserve Bank, where $1 million in worn out dollar (and other denomination) bills is shredded. There, she schemes with fellow employees, single mother Queen Latifah, and trailer chick Katie Holmes to steal the money, instead of shredding it. Each has needs that the money will satisfy.
There have been several movies like this about women robbing banks. And this one, for me, was considerably less exciting than the others. It was more predictable and less believable. For instance, if you steal thousands in dollar bills, unless you are Congressman William Jefferson of Louisiana, you’d presumable be smarter than to stash it in and around your house.
And you and your boyfriends and significant others wouldn’t be spending like millionaires while still working as janitors . . . at a bank, no less. It sets off too many alarms and red flags. And smart robbers, as smart as these women appear to be, wouldn’t get so greedy as to repeatedly steal more and make stupid mistakes.
Then, there’s the ending, which as a lawyer that I am, is really hard to believe would happen.
There are some funny lines and moments, and it’s entertaining enough. But it’s not a great movie. Not even close.

* “27 Dresses“: This one is a definite chick flick. And although mildly funny and entertaining, it’s mostly cliche and predictable.
The movie has some really funny moments. The problem is, they’re all in the first ten minutes, when we see always-a-bridesmaid-never-a-bride Katherine Heigl running back and forth between two weddings at which she is a bridesmaid, to the tune of Michael Jackson’s “Don’t Stop ‘Til You Get Enough.” Yes, a joint Jewish-Hindu wedding where the plump Jewish bride wears a sari and a diamond dot on her forehead is funny . . . the first time.
A glammed-down Heigl–whom make-up artists transform into an unremarkable Plain Jane–has been a bridesmaid 27 times and saved all the tacky dresses to prove it. She has her heart set on her boss, Edward Burns, who barely notices her. But when her gorgeous, narcissistic model sister comes to town, Burns falls for the vapid model and asks her to marry him. Guess who gets stuck planning the wedding?
And in planning the wedding, Heigl meets James Marsden, the wedding columnist for a New York Times-esque daily newspaper. She doesn’t know that Marsden is her favorite columnist, though, and she repeatedly blows him off, as he tries to get to know her. Soon, she falls for his charm, while he is working on a cynical expose of marriages and the wedding industry, using Heigl as his “subject.”
I can’t tell you what happens next because it would spoil the predictable, hackneyed-if-romantic ending. You get the picture. There’s nothing deep here. But it isn’t horrible.

By Debbie Schlussel
I only wish incompetent Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert would actually listen to his own words. And DO AS HE SAYS, NOT AS HE DOES. In defending Israel’s muted and insufficient response to repeated Palestinian rocket attacks on Israeli civilians, he said this:

Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert pledged to strike Palestinian militants “without compromise, without concessions and without mercy.”

And there’s this Olmert quote:

We shall continue fighting Jihad, Hamas and their allies with determination and without mercy.

Oh, really?

In keeping score, let’s do the rundown on the this man who speaks loudly and carries a toothpick. “Without compromise, without concessions and without mercy.” Does that jibe with:
* The wholesale giveaway of Israeli land in Gaza and the so-called West Bank to the enemy?
* The forced uprooting of Jews from their homes in places like Amona, the beating of them by Israeli police, in the name of the enemy?
* The repeated release of thousands of Palestinians and Hezbollah terrorist mass-murderers from Israeli jails to freedom?
* The plan to give Syria the Golan Heights in exchange for a sheaf of paper?
* The claim by Olmert that Israeli neighborhoods and housing violate a fiction-based claim that they are illegal?
* The plan to divide up the Holy City of Jerusalem and give the holiest of Jewish sites to Muslims who previously urinated in and on them and covered them in garbage?
Without compromise, without concessions and without mercy.
If only Olmert and President Bush lived by these words. But they are more like jello pudding than anything else. The only recent Israeli prime minister who lived by these words was the great Yitzchak Shamir. But he is dead–Blessed Be His Memory–and so, too, is a strong, courageous will like his in Israeli “leadership.”
Speak Loudly and Carry a Toothpick.

By Debbie Schlussel
Yesterday, Department of Homeland Security chief Michael “Serpenthead” Chertoff a/k/a “Mr. Burns” announced that, several years, after becoming DHS chief, he will finally start getting tough at America’s northern border. Or will he?
Chertoff announced that, beginning January 31, travelers seeking entry into the U.S. at the northern border must produce both a photo ID and proof of citizenship, such as a birth certificate. That’s great. What took so long?
And will Chertoff really enforce this? Last year, he announced to the Detroit Economic Club that he was waiving all such tougher requirements for those up to the age of 21 (and, in some cases, age 23), in the interest of “school field trips” and “sporting events” (like that HAMAS soccer league).
And in his yesterday announcement of the new requirements, Chertoff made this incredibly naive statement:

HUH?: “Serpenthead” Claims No-one Has Violated Our Northern Borders Yet

I can guarantee if we don’t make this change, eventually there will come a time when someone will come across the border exploiting the vulnerabilities of the system.

There will come a time?! PUH-LEEZE. Mr. Chertoff, there have been many of those times. They have repeatedly exploited the vulnerabilities–on YOUR watch–and they will continue to.
Is he really that naive? Does he really think that no-one has yet violated our Northern Border? Come on.
Finally doing something minor like this in his final year in office is too little, too late . . . and not enough.

By Debbie Schlussel
Although I do not like the anti-Israel, left-wing, anti-religious apartheid Gulf-state cheerleader Christopher Hitchens, I do like a couple of hilarious sentences in his op-ed in today’s Wall Street Journal. “The Perils of Identity Politics” is a well-written piece against those who push voting for the “first female President” or the “first Black President.” Some of what he writes has been said before by many people (including me–I wrote exactly what he wrote about the fervor for Colin Powell to run for the White House during his book tour; and about those who vote for Obama because he’s Black being the same as those voting against him because he’s Black). But this is choice:

Those of us who follow politics seriously rather than view it as a game show do not look at Hillary Clinton and simply think “first woman president.” We think — for example — “first ex-co-president” or “first wife of a disbarred lawyer and impeached former incumbent” or “first person to use her daughter as photo-op protection during her husband’s perjury rap.”

Amen to that.

By Debbie Schlussel
Here’s video of my appearance, yesterday morning, on FOX News Channel’s “Fox & Friends,” regarding my former boss, former Congressman Mark Siljander, and the federal indictment regarding his involvement with the Islamic American Relief Agency. Thanks to James Parker, super-producer of “The Mike Church Show,” on Sirius Patriot Channel 144, on which I do movie reviews (and talk politics) every Friday morning, at around 10:30 a.m. Eastern Time.

By Debbie Schlussel
An Arab barber in New York illegally secured green cards for other Arabs by bribing a Citizenship and Immigration official. We already know so many similar schemes have happened in Detroitistan and other parts of the country.
The problem with cases like this is that while they caught these people, you know it’s the tip of the iceberg. There are so many others like this selling out our country, who haven’t been caught because so few of these cases are actually investigated:

A Department of Homeland Security official was charged Thursday with soliciting a $12,000 bribe in exchange for a green card.
Jose Gomez, 58, who approved green cards in the office of Citizenship and Immigration Services, was allegedly in cahoots with the owner of a salon in Astoria, Queens, who acted as a go-between for the official.

Muslim Alien Thanks America With a Special Salute

Gomez demanded $12,000 for the green card from a confidential informant who secretly recorded his conversations with Gomez and the salon owner, Farid Bouchaib, during the past year, according to an affidavit unsealed Thursday in Brooklyn Federal Court.
Gomez was released on a $150,000 bond. Bouchaib was detained pending a bail hearing.

More:

A federal immigration agent and a Queens barber have been charged with processing green cards for immigrants in exchange for bribes, federal prosecutors said today.
The immigration officer, Jose Gomez, was accepting thousands of dollars for official green cards that he processed out of a U.S. Customs and Immigration Service office in Long Island, according to federal court papers filed in the Eastern District of New York. The barber, Farid Bouchaib of Astoria, acted as a middleman, authorities said.
Both were arrested in front of Mr. Gomez’s house in East Elmhurst Wednesday night and arraigned yesterday, authorities said.
An undercover agent helped to bring the scheme to light by wearing a wire to meetings in parked cars in Queens and inside Mr. Bouchaib’s Astoria barber shop, the court papers said. At the meetings, the agent brought the two men cash that eventually totaled $12,000 in exchange for immigration forms.
During the last meeting, on Wednesday, the immigration officer and the barber met with the undercover agent in a car parked outside of Mr. Gomez’s house, where they discussed the green card and the agent handed over a final $2,500, according the complaint.

We can’t stop bribery of greedy officials. But, if only we strictly limited the number of Arabs and Muslims who were allowed to immigrate to America, that would help solve a big part of the problem.
Good luck, America. G-d save our sinking nation.