'What Happened in Room 2806': The Evidence Against Dominique Strauss-Kahn

At New York Times:

Even as the criminal case against Dominique Strauss-Kahn erodes with each new example of his accuser’s crumbling credibility, the central question remains unanswered: What actually happened in Room 2806 of the Sofitel New York on May 14?



Certain facts are not in dispute. As the illustration below shows, electronic evidence reveals what time the accuser, a 32-year-old hotel housekeeper from Guinea, entered Mr. Strauss-Kahn’s suite. Physical evidence indicates that a sexual encounter took place.



The housekeeper has characterized the encounter as a sexual assault. Lawyers for Mr. Strauss-Kahn, 62, have said any sexual act was consensual. Others have offered other theories.



Here is a look at three possible sequences of events, and how the available evidence — physical, electronic and witness testimony — could support each of them.

Read it all at the link.

Dominique Strauss-Kahn Sexual Assault Prosecution Collapses: Accuser's Credibility Destroyed

Interesting story at New York Times, "One Revelation After Another Undercut Srauss-Kahn Accuser's Credibility." (At Memeorandum.)

This isn't something I followed closely. These are serious allegations, but that Strauss-Kahn's a socialist made it amusing, especially in that he was expected to be the next Socialist Party candidate for the French presidency.

And more at this Nightline report, which has some strong statements from the plaintiff's attorney:

Also at Telegraph UK, "Dominique Strauss-Kahn walks free after maid rape case crumbles."

BONUS: At Legal Insurrection, "Strauss-Kahn and credibility problems."

'The Crush at the Afghan Exits'

An editorial at the Wall Street Journal.

The NATO allies will follow Obama's move and cut-and-run from the deployment: "France to gradually pull troops from Afghanistan."

I noted previously that it's not the Afghans who're forcing us out. Domestic political calculations are driving policy, and I pray the region doesn't deteriorate into a million Mumbais, but that's asking a lot from the Man Upstairs.

The French Are Mad — Mad! — at the Arrest of Socialist Dominique Strauss-Kahn on Sexual Assault Charges

At New York Times, "As Case Unfolds, France Speculates and Steams."

PARIS — France’s shock at the arrest of Dominique Strauss-Kahn on sexual assault charges has turned among some to suspicion and anger, with his defenders questioning the initial New York police account and speculating about entrapment, and many others characterizing the photos of the handcuffed suspect as insulting and unfair.

Mr. Strauss-Kahn, 62, was arrested on charges of attempted rape and illegal imprisonment of a chambermaid in a French-owned hotel in Midtown Manhattan, the Sofitel, and was arraigned on Monday in New York.

The charges against a man thought to have had the best chance of becoming France’s next president in elections only a year away, and who is the prominent managing director of the International Monetary Fund, have exploded most political assumptions here.

Poor dears.

Actually, I'm with Judge Melissa Jackson on this, as she remarked when denying Strauss-Kahn's defense attorneys' request for bail: “When I hear that your client was at J.F.K. Airport about to board a flight” ... “that raises some concern.”

Well, yeah.

See also Matt Welch, "BHL: France's National Disgrace" (on Bernard Henri-Levy, via Althouse).

France's Burka Ban Takes Effect

At New York Times, "France Enforces Ban on Full-Face Veils in Public." And from Telegraph UK, "France’s burka ban is a victory for tolerance":

Despite some high-profile protests, France’s banning of the burka is enormously popular with the public. Unfortunately, as in Britain, almost anything politicians do that the voters approve of tends to be denounced as populisme – a particularly dread charge among the over-earnest French political class – and instead of enjoying the deserved benefits, President Nicolas Sarkozy has found himself on the defensive.

Sarko’s modest measure (the burka is forbidden only in public places, the fines are piffling and the enforcement procedures incomprehensible) has led to much talk of sledgehammers and nuts, warnings of an apocalyptic Muslim backlash and claims that the Republican tradition of liberté is being compromised in a seedy ploy to combat the resurgence of the hard-Right Front National under its new leader Marine Le Pen.

Almost anything, in fact, than an acknowledgement that the public overwhelmingly sees the ban as right for France, beneficial to its Muslim communities and justified – if on no other grounds – as a statement in support of liberalism against darkness. Approval runs right across the spectrum, with Fadela Amara, the Algerian-born former housing minister in Sarkozy’s government, calling the burka “a kind of tomb, a horror for those trapped within it”, and André Gerin, the Communist MP who headed the commission investigating the grounds for a ban, describing it as “the tip of an iceberg of oppression”.

Mme Amara is Fadela Amara, "the Algerian-born former housing minister in Sarkozy’s government ..."

That part about Muslim women not having a choice isn't something that progressive leftists want to talk about. Frankly, the burka ban is apparently evidence of French "discrimination."