Instead, lesbian relationships have often been regarded as harmless and incomparable to heterosexual ones unless the participants attempted to assert privileges traditionally enjoyed by men.
Gleeson said while the Australian legal team did not have access to the seized documents, there were "reasonable grounds to consider that the materials over which Timor-Leste asserts privilege may include written statements or affidavits by a former Asis officer made to Mr Collaery on behalf of Timor-Leste, disclosing national security information of Australia".
Obama only asserted privilege over "post-February 4, 2011 documents".
The danger of asserting privileges is that they often come with unwelcome responsibilities.
President Obama has already reserved the right to assert executive privilege.
Whether to assert the privilege is a difficult choice because of the potential for losing one's position in the government for not being cooperative in an investigation.
"It is but a small step," Judge Maris wrote, "to assert a privilege against any disclosure of records merely because they might prove embarrassing to government officials".
Many of the documents are already in Little Rock, and Mr. Clinton should turn them over promptly without trying to assert executive privilege.
Bailey's attempt to assert her privilege – "What's wrong with Hong Kong, why did you come to this country, this is our country" – didn't fly.
The court explained that allowing a company to assert the privilege against self-incrimination "would have a detrimental impact on the government's efforts to prosecute white-collar crime, one of the most serious problems confronting law enforcement authorities".
In trials, grand jury proceedings and most Congressional hearings, witnesses are typically made to assert the privilege but once, if they are forced to appear at all, Mr. Weingarten noted.
