Thing is, he’s been known as Randy Andy since the 80s. I bet he’s put it about a fair bit. Questions about historical consent are going to be almost impossible to determine.
Shagging around and abusing minors are not the same.
Of course they’re not.
You seemed to be implying otherwise.
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Only following what others are saying on twitter but seems that Judge Kaplan is unimpressed with the arguments made by Prince Andrew’s legal team.
It’s bizarre to me that so much time was taken up discussing what ‘potential defendant’ meant. The fact that Giuffre has brought this claim against Prince Andrew automatically brings him into that category. Res ipsa loquitur. It couldn’t be more plain.
Also bizarre that arguments were being explored that because the parties agreed to keep the settlement confidential that the intention to waive claims against third parties is frustrated because, so the reasoning goes, they could not be told about it. That’s just bizarre.
Very odd arguments being made, it seems. The Judge also apparently trying to crack some extremely inappropriate jokes during the proceedings, which is just incomprehensible.
For someone coming from the British legal tradition, American legal practice is often absolutely bizarre. Between the state-state and state-Federal, principles like precedent seem not readily distinguishable from obiter dictum. I don’t really understand many explanations from American lawyers, until a Canadian lawyer with experience in both systems weighs in. The more I learn about US patent litigation, the less I understand.
In particular, I would guess the ‘potential defendant’ idea is really running to whether or not a settlement in Florida and under the definition of a defendant in that jurisdiction can be binding in New York.
That point in your 3rd paragraph actually needs some puzzling through to even follow.
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It’s just weird because the agreement can be relied upon openly if it is breached by one of the parties. Ergo, if Giuffre pursued third parties that the agreement was intended to bar her from doing so, the secrecy of the agreement would no longer apply.
But from the twitter commentary it seemed that the Judge was seriously considering that the secrecy element frustrated the intention to settle potential claims against third parties.
A very good article on the Russian force build up where the journalist did very good research and interviewed several of the leading experts for commentary. I recommend this one, despite my usual misgivings of Wall Street Journal.
This article would explain a great deal, very clearly, to someone who knows perhaps a bit less than me about the build up. Very, very god article indeed. It also goes into great detail explaining how useful a source Open Source Intelligence is, and how closely it compares to the knowledge of CIA and MI6 etc. on the subject (spoiler: Secret Services don’t know much more about either movements or intentions than Open Source).
This article is certainly a very good read if you are interested. It kind of compiles, in less words, a lot of the stuff I have posted previously while adding some explanations that I think will be useful to some:
And now you guys can get back to discussing the virtues, or lack of, of Prince Andrew and etc. 
Edit: to evade pay wall, you can enter the article through this twitter account (for instance) :
Note, you must manually go into Muzyka’s twitter for this to work and use his direct link.
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Perhaps his mum, although she’s probably having doubts at this stage.
Perhaps pining for the days when such awkwardness among the spares could be managed with confinement and eventual disappearance in the Tower.
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Although Andrew, as it’s been noted, has always been the Queen’s favourite child.
Imagine that! Having a ‘favourite child’! Antiquated, inbred, weirdos.
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That hasn’t happened for a few hundred years so I doubt she would know about that
Or do Lizard People live that long?
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Why wouldn’t she know about it? Did she skip history lessons? 
Paywall 
Well, not if you enter it from this direction:
Try to read the article through Muzyka’s twitter. Works for me, I then evade the pay wall. Does this work for you ?
EDIT: @Iftikhar , for this to work you must manually go into Muzyka’s twitter and not click on the link. If you click on the link you get to the pay wall. If you manually go into Muzyka’s twitter, his link from that article lets you get directly in !
Sorry for the confusion, I didn’t know this originally. So I tested it now.
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It isn’t only our politics which has lost its respect for decorum, tradition and common sense.
Out of court settlements are extremely problematic. If someone is guilty of a crime they should face justice before the law regardless of whether they are wealthy enough to pay off their victims. On the other hand, they also encourage unscrupulous individuals to press claims in order to gain financially.
Apart from time saving, is there any other reason that they should be legal?
You don’t settle criminal matters out of court.
I doubt there is a functional legal system in the world that could deal with the case load if no matters were allowed to be settled. I suppose it would be a bonanza for lawyers, but we would need far more judges and courthouses than we have now.
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Obviously I’m not a lawyer, but isn’t coercion of minors to have sex a crime? Isn’t that what is being discussed?
Does the practicality argument override the gross inequality argument?
This practice is also deeply damaging to democracy as it creates one law for the rich and another for the poor.
It is potentially a criminal matter, but the case in question is civil, not criminal. Different burden of proof, different consequences, etc.
Settling out of court is central to the functioning of the legal system. If you think democracy would be better served by a non-functional legal system, I have my doubts. The overwhelming majority of pre-trial settlements are not in the least problematic, simply a mutual recognition of cost-benefit-risk. Plus, I can guarantee you that if the rich could virtually assure that a trial could be put off for decades at a time, at tremendous expense, access to justice for all would be damaged, not improved.