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In the end, it was his long and unblemished track record of fairness which saved his judicial butt, and that’s just as it should be.

In the modern world, with its penchant for brutal and superficial decisions made in the heat of the second (moments being deemed far too long), it rarely happens.

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So give thanks for the four-member panel of the Ontario Judicial Council, which Tuesday released its decision in the Bernd Zabel case, and to all of those who rode to Zabel’s rescue, either by testifying in person or writing letters describing what a good and impartial judge he is and has been.

Zabel is the Ontario Court judge who, the day after the U.S. presidential nomination, did the inexplicably dopey thing of wearing a bright red ball cap bearing the campaign slogan of Donald Trump (“Make America Great Again”) into his Hamilton, Ont. courtroom.

Photo by Peter J. Thompson / National Post

He wore the hat until the morning break, at which point he returned it to a desk drawer. When court ended early that afternoon (he ran out of cases) and Zabel was leaving, a Crown prosecutor said, “You’ve lost your hat.”