USA: Lock him up! Why is repeat offender Donald Trump still a free man? by - S imon Tisdall

A distraught Napoleon talked to coffee bushes on St Helena. Emperor Haile Selassie of Ethiopia hung around the haberdashery department of Jolly’s in Bath. Uganda’s Idi Amin plotted bloody revenge from a Novotel in Jeddah. Only Alfred the Great made a successful comeback.

All of which brings us to Donald Trump, currently in exile at his luxury club in Bedminster, New Jersey. Whingeing amid the manicured greens and bunkers of his exclusive golf course, the defeated president recalls an ageing Bonnie Prince Charlie – a sort of “king over the water” with water features. Like deposed leaders throughout history, he obsesses about a return to power.

Yet as Senate minority leader Mitch McConnell moves to kill off a 9/11-style national commission to investigate the 6 January Capitol Hill insurrection, the pressing question is not whether Trump can maintain cult-like sway over Republicans, or even whether he will run again in 2024. The question that should most concern Americans who care about democracy is: why isn’t Trump in jail?

The fact he is not, and has not been charged with anything, is a genuine puzzle – some might say a scandal, even a conspiracy. Trump’s actual and potential criminal rap sheet long predates the Capitol siege. It includes alleged abuses of power, obstruction of justice, fraud, tax evasion, Russian money-laundering, election tampering, conflicts of interest, hush-money bribes, assassination – and a lot of lies.

Read more at: Lock him up! Why is repeat offender Donald Trump still a free man? | Simon Tisdall | The Guardian

Poland: EU takes Poland to court over law ′undermining′ judges

The European Commission is taking Poland to the European Court of Justice (ECJ) over changes to its legal system that it argues "undermines" judicial independence, it said on Wednesday.

Brussels wants the bloc's highest court to make an interim order suspending the 2019 Polish law until a final judgment is delivered.

EU Justice Commissioner Didier Reynders told a news conference: "The Commission believes that the law infringes upon the independence of the judiciary in Poland and is incompatible with the primacy of the law of the [European] Union."

Read more at: EU takes Poland to court over law ′undermining′ judges | News | DW | 31.03.2021

France: Former French president Nicolas Sarkozy sentenced to jail for corruption

When the verdict came, it reduced the Paris court to a stunned silence: Nicolas Sarkozy was guilty of corruption and influence peddling, and sentenced to three years in prison, two of them suspended. France’s president from 2007 to 2012 had played an “active role” in forging a “corruption pact” with his lawyer and a senior magistrate to obtain information on a separate investigation into political donations, the leading judge declared, and there was “serious and concurring evidence” of collaboration between the three men to break the law.

Read more at: Former French president Nicolas Sarkozy sentenced to jail for corruption | Nicolas Sarkozy | The Guardian

Hungary says it blocked EU budget over migration 'blackmail' - "which is total nonsense by Orban who destroyed Democracy in his country" said a European parliamentarian

Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban said Wednesday his country vetoed the EU's budget over plans to tie funding to respect for the rule of law, as it amounted to "blackmailing" countries that oppose migration.

Read more at: Hungary says it blocked EU budget over migration 'blackmail'

USA - Judicial independence: Commentary: Politics is threatening local judicial independence - by Diane Shelley

Politics has no business in America’s court system but it has done so over the years.

Rad more at: Commentary: Politics is threatening local judicial independence - Chicago Tribune

European Justice System: Italy's Silvio Berlusconi begins community service for tax fraud

Italy's Silvio Berlusconi began community service for tax fraud today in a spectacular fall from grace for the flamboyant ex-premier, who will likely seek political gain from the symbolic punishment.

The billionaire tycoon, who was convicted last year and has been expelled from parliament, has been ordered to work once a week for up to a year as a volunteer in a hospice for Alzheimer's patients near Milan.

Silvio Berlusconi began community service for tax fraud today in a spectacular fall from grace for the flamboyant ex-premier, who will likely seek political gain from the symbolic punishment.

Note EU-Digest: Bravo to the European Justice System (Italy) for having tackled this problem. Good example for US Judicial System to also go after "high profile" "too big to fail " US Bankers in the US,  who have dodged criminal prosecution.

Read more: Italy's Silvio Berlusconi begins community service for tax fraud - The Economic Times

10 Ways to Stop Corporate Dominance of Politics

The recent US Supreme Court decision to allow unlimited corporate spending in politics just may be the straw that breaks the plutocracy’s back. Among the 10 suggestions to combat this is also to Require shareholders to approve political spending by their corporations. Public Citizen and the Brennan Center for Justice are among the groups advocating this measure, and some members of Congress appear interested. Britain has required such shareholder approval since 2000.

10 Ways to Stop Corporate Dominance of Politics | Civil Liberties | AlterNet