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DECEMBER 3, 2020 | The Jewish Home
violating Page’s “constitutional and other legal rights in connection with unlawful surveillance and investigation of him by the United States Government.” Page had been one of the first Trump administration officials to be put under surveillance by the FBI as part of “Crossfire Hurricane,” a probe of the campaign’s ties with Russian intelligence. The other figures included in the witch-hunt were all later convicted of unrelated federal crimes, including Michael Flynn, Paul Manafort, and George Papadopoulos. In the lawsuit, the energy executive and foreign policy expert accuses the FBI of willfully misleading the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (FISA) when asking for a warrant to wiretap his phone calls. At the time, agents justified the request by pointing to allegations in the now-debunked dossier compiled by English spy Christopher Steele that Page was in contact with Russia intelligence officers during the presidential election. Page also demanded monetary compensation for what he said was the economic, emotional, and professional damage he suffered from the
illegitimate probe. The lawsuit comes after DOJ Inspector General Michael Horowitz found in a 2019 report that the FBI was guilty of numerous professional and ethical mistakes in its probe of Page, including failing to notify the court that he had been a CIA asset in the past. “This case is about holding accountable the entities and individuals who are responsible for the most egregious violation and abuse of the [Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act] FISA statute since it was enacted over forty years ago,” read the court filing. “Since not a single proven fact ever established complicity with Russia involving Dr. Page, there never was probable cause to seek or obtain the FISA Warrants targeting him on this basis,” it added. “The facts of this case…have been relatively well-briefed,” said Page attorney Tim Parlatore, in an interview with Fox News on Saturday. “Between the Horowitz report and various congressional [investigations] on this subject, there are no bombshell revelations in this lawsuit other than Page is seeking to be made whole from the individuals who have completely destroyed his life.”
Word of the Year
According to Merriam-Webster, we’ve all had the same thing on our minds in 2020. The online dictionary source annually chooses a word of the year. This year’s most popular word? Pandemic. Yup, that’s hardly a surprise. “That probably isn’t a big shock,” Peter Sokolowski, editor at large for Merriam-Webster, admitted. “Often the big news story has a technical word that’s associated with it, and in this case, the word pandemic is not just technical but has become general. It’s probably the word by which we’ll refer to this period in the future,” he added. On March 11, when the World Health Organization declared the coronavirus outbreak a global pandemic, lookups on the Merriam-Webster site for “pandemic” spiked hugely – 115,806% (not a typo!) higher than on the same date the year before. Site interest for the word has remained significantly high through the year. Pandemic, with roots in Latin and Greek, is a combination of “pan,” for all, and “demos,” for people or population. The word pandemic dates to the mid-1600s. Merriam-Webster had to add certain words to its dictionary because of the pandemic. For example, while “coronavirus” had been in the dictionary for decades, “COVID-19” was coined in February. Thirty-four days later, Merriam-Webster had it up online, along with a couple dozen other entries that were revised to reflect the health emergency. “That’s the shortest period of time we’ve ever seen a word go from coinage to entry,” Sokolowski noted. “The word had this urgency.” Coronavirus was among runners up for word of the year as it jumped into the mainstream. Quarantine, asymptomatic, mamba (related to the death of Kobe Bryant, called the Black Mamba), kraken (a mythical sea monster chosen by Seattle’s new National Hockey League as its mas-
cot), defund, antebellum, irregardless, icon, schadenfreude, and malarkey (made popular by Joe Biden, who seems to love the word) were also runners-up based on lookup spikes around specific events. For those who love to hear about the origin of words, “quarantine” has Italian roots. It was used during the Black Death of the 1300s for the period of time a new ship coming into port would have to wait outside a city to prevent disease. The “quar” in quarantine derives from 40, for the 40 days the ship was required to wait.
Rock Return
A piece of marble taken from the National Roman Museum in 2017 was returned this week with a note in which the thief admitted her wrongdoing. The museum posted an image of the package along with the note sent with the stolen object. “To whom it may concern: “I would like to return this rock to its rightful place – anywhere within the Roman ruins – and I would greatly appreciate your assistance! “Please forgive me for being such an American [idiot] and taking something that was not mine to take. I feel terribly for not only taking this item from its rightful place, but placing writing on it as well. That was extremely wrong of me, and I now realize in my later adult life how inconsiderate and disrespectful that was. I have attempted many hours of scrubbing and cleaning to remove, but to no success. “Please forgive me!” The piece had scrawled with words “To Sam, Love Jess” on the marble indelible ink.
