Using Up Somebody Else's 15 Minutes

Mr. Dershowitz to the white courtesy phone, puh-leeze!

Politico was desperate for a male public figure to balance out the four female public figures in its article about women who have challenged the awesome tweeting power of Donald Trump; so, of course, they chose Alan Dershowitz, who hasn't suffered at all from the bile of Trump's Twitter attentions.  Oh, no, quite the opposite:

Over the past year, Dershowitz has become a regular talking head on Fox News, arguing that bringing an obstruction of justice charge against Trump would trigger a constitutional crisis for the country — and that Trump had every right to fire former FBI director James Comey. The counterintuitive take from a one-time Democratic icon has made him a Trump favorite — an uncomfortable position for a man who says he voted for Hillary Clinton and hopes Vice President Joe Biden challenges Trump in 2020.

“My really, really close friends say, ‘You’re 100 percent right in your analysis, but can’t you just shut the f–k up and not talk at all,’” he said. “They tell me, ‘This is a time for selective silence.’ My nephew thinks I’m helping keep in office one of the greatest dangers in American history. I tell him I’m just standing up for principle. He tells me that I don’t have to stand up so loud.”

I'm assuming Dershowitz's "really, really close friends" are not lawyers; or not criminal lawyers; or they all work for FoxNews, the only news source Trump and Dershowitz seem to rely on.  Because recently, Dershowitz was spouting off once again about things he really doesn't seem to know anything about:

“He’s playing right into their hands,” Dershowitz said. “I have to tell you, I had an enormous amount of respect for Mueller having seen him up close when he was in Boston and in the government. He is not playing this effectively, he is being sloppy.”

He again cited purported improprieties hyped by Fox News in recent weeks, including politically charged text messages from an FBI agent removed from the probe, and the obtaining of transition team emails from the General Services Administration and then from Trump’s lawyers.

“You wear belt and suspenders when you are going after the president, you get a warrant,” Dershowitz said.

Because, of course, this didn't happen:

But Peter Carr, spokesman for the Special Counsel's Office, told Axios early this morning: "When we have obtained emails in the course of our ongoing criminal investigation, we have secured either the account owner's consent or appropriate criminal process."

And this hasn't been reported:

According to the Journal’s sources, Strzok’s talk of an “insurance policy” against Trump’s electoral victory “was meant to convey that the bureau needed to aggressively investigate allegations of collusion between Donald Trump’s campaign and Russia,” and was not intended to “suggest a secret plan to harm the candidate but rather address a colleague who believed the [FBI] could take its time because Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton was certain to win the election.”

In the original text message, which was sent to FBI lawyer Lisa Page, Strzok wrote of Trump that, “I want to believe the path you threw out for consideration in Andy’s office — that there’s no way he gets elected — but I’m afraid we can’t take that risk. It’s like an insurance policy in the unlikely event you die before you’re 40.”

And this is utterly incorrect:

“When they ran the transition, the GSA, the Government Services Administration gave them the computers, the software and the server. And every time they went on those computers, every time you go in any GSA-owned computer, you get a notice, there’s no privacy, the e-mail you send belongs to a federal government,” Napolitano reminded.

“So Mueller’s people either — we don’t know what — knock on the doors and say you have the e-mails or got a subpoena. Perfectly legal and done every day of the week,” Napolitano concluded.

“As a matter of course, to not get them would be derelict,” Smith noted.

“Correct,” Napolitano replied.

and furthermore:

“I’m critical of our colleagues that say there’s no ‘there’ there,” Napolitano admitted. “You know what, Shep? This is a jigsaw puzzle with 100,000 pieces and we see a piece here and a piece there and people say it doesn’t make any sense. It takes time to amass all of these pieces of evidence so that we see the jigsaw puzzle completed, that’s what Mueller and company are trying to do.”

Well, he watches certain FoxNews programs, but not others; just like the President!  But Alan Dershowitz knows all and sees all!  He's a Harvard Law Professor Emeritus!  Kneel before his mighty knowledge!

What a putz.  I don't know what the principle is, but he's certainly lost the plot.