My guess (also not a lawyer) is to render the verdict as appeal proof as possible. If he wasn't allowed to speak, he would have claimed that his rights were violated and if he had been allowed to give the closing remarks himself, he would have been found totally Innocent.

Engoron let him talk relatively briefly, cut him off when it was clear he wasn't staying on topic, and closed off this appeal argument.

$175,000 for 50 years? He's 71 now so he went into prison at 21. That means he spent virtually his entire life in prison. He could have done so many things, but instead he needed to sit in a prison cell. All because he was wrongly convicted.

And because I'm a math geek and need to figure this stuff out, $175,000 over 50 years is $3,500 a year. If we calculate what he would have earned at the federal minimum wage over that time frame (ignoring bank account interest or inflation just to keep things simple), we'd get over $500,000.

They're giving him a third of what he should have earned at bare minimum. (And that ignores all the other horrible things involved with being wrongfully imprisoned for 50 years.)

So her "logic" (and I'm stretching that word to the breaking point) is that God said he wouldn't destroy the world again with a global flood. Let's say we accept that as fact: God will not destroy the world via a global flood.

The problem is that God isn't destroying the world, man is. And man isn't destroying the world via a giant flood. He's destroying it by changing the global climate to the point that he can't keep up. (To be technical, man is destroying his ability to survive in the world, not the world itself. The Earth would be here even if we decided to burn more fossil fuels.)

So even if we accept Genesis 8 as a valid "argument" (more word stretching), it doesn't apply. Now, if scientists start saying that a deity plans on instituting a global flood via 40 days and nights of rain, then I'll accept Genesis 8 as a counter-argument.

Seriously? So if two women or two men walk down the street holding hands and then kiss each other, they could be arrested for "lewd conduct" while a heterosexual couple doing the same exact thing is left alone? This city ordinance sounds like it's just waiting for a legal challenge.

Wait, he's standing next to a divorcee? Does he know how dangerous that is? Johnson has said that divorce is one of the reasons why we have mass shootings! For his own safety, he needs to keep Boebert at least 10 feet away at all times!!!

"She was never my lawyer, but also attorney client privilege means she can't testify against me!"

They pretend to support hypothetical exceptions to abortion bans, which for the most part do not apply in actual reality.

I'm glad they pointed this out. Many Republican abortion bans will say they don't apply if the women's life is at risk, but they word it so vaguely, raise the penalties so high, and put the doctor's freedom in the hands of a jury to determine if the woman was "dying enough." The result is that women aren't given life saving abortions until they are actively dying.

Even if the fetus has such severe abnormalities that there's zero chance of a "baby" at the end of the pregnancy, the woman will be told that she needs to risk her life and carry it to term because "pro life."

I'm not a lawyer, but even I know that in court (or hearings like this one) you never ask a person a question if you don't know what they are going to say.

So either the Republicans missed Legal Questioning 101 (and have never watched a Legal Eagle video) or their "evidence" is so flimsy that "there isn't enough to impeach" was their best opening.

From the description of the incident, it definitely sounded like he feared for his life. A 6 foot something guy keeps advancing on him, asking why he's thinking of the guy's penis. He tells the guy to leave him alone multiple times, but the guy keeps advancing. He retreats multiple times, but the guy keeps at it. He even tries knocking the phone out of the guy's hand, but the guy keeps at it.

It definitely sounds like the guy was afraid of where this was going and tried all of the non-lethal options (retreat, tell the person to stop) before resorting to pulling out his gun. The YouTube "pranker" has nobody to blame but himself. He should have stopped when asked instead of repeatedly pressing the defendant for a YouTube "prank" video.

(I use "prank" in quotes because I don't consider this type of thing a real prank. It's just a guy acting like an idiot and calling it "a prank." A real prank should leave all involved laughing when it's revealed, not leave one person fearing for their life.)

It's against federal law to purchase a handgun if you're under federal indictment. If he really bought the handgun, he'd have needed to have filled out a form. On that form, he'd be asked if he's currently under federal indictment. If he answered yes, he wouldn't be allowed to complete the sale. If Trump answered no, he broke federal law by lying on a government form to buy a gun. This is the exact crime Hunter Biden is being charged with.

There was fear on the left and hope on the right that DeSantis would be "smart Trump." Just as evil as Trump is, but with more brains to be able to pull stuff off and less likely to be distracted by petty rivalries.

Since then, DeSantis has shown that he's not as smart as people thought he was, definitely can't sway crowds like Trump can, and is absolutely willing to pursue petty rivalries even when they don't benefit him.

They see colleges as "liberal wokeness indoctrination centers" because their kids go to college and return more liberal. In a way, they're right, but it's not because colleges are actively indoctrinating students.

When you grow up in a town, you're likely to be surrounded by people like you. They all look like you and think like you. People who look and think different are "strange others" and stereotypes about these people abound.

Then, you go to college. Suddenly, you're surrounded by people who look different and think differently. That stereotype you have about Group A? Well, you've now met 5 people who are in Group A and none of them fit the stereotype. Your biases get shattered and you start to see people as actual people instead of "strange others."

Then you go back home. Nobody back home has met all the people you met. They still use the old stereotypes that you've discarded. To them, you've changed. They're right, but it's because your experiences have shaped how you see the world not because someone strapped you to a chair and forced "wokeness" into you.