Thursday Open Thread

Please feel free to write comments on this post on whatever topic you like! (As usual, please avoid personal insults of each other, vulgarities aimed at each other or at third parties, or other things that are likely to poison the discussion.)

Comments

[Brett Bellmore]

Looks to me like we're now entering the end game for the Constitution and America as we knew it. I'm expecting either a Switch in Time, or Court packing, in the next few years.

Maybe both, in that order.

[Moderation4ever]

What do you mean by "America as we knew it"? Was there ever a time like this? America is an evolving country and there has always been opposition to that evolution. Think about group that saw an "end as they knew it"
- natives as white settlers moved in
- plantation owners as slaves were emancipated
- nativists as Irish, Germans, and Italians immigrated
- segregationist as civil rights laws were past

I could go on, but why should the country stop evolving now so some can have it stay "as they knew it"

[David Bremer]

I vaguely recall a stat from a podcast (Radiolab of Freakonomics I believe) that a little less than half of all Americans to have ever lived are currently alive today.

I think about this when I hear about how America has changed, "not who we are," or America as we know it. This is who we are and this is the America we know, if for no other reason than that the modern world is how a majority of Americans who have ever lived experienced it.

[Sarcastr0]

People have been saying this since America was founded.

And they were always at least a little bit correct.

[Krayt]

The big lesson from history is to not let government grow its own power at its own whim.

Supreme Courts falling sway to "changing desires of the people", not when discovering new freedoms, but when declaring new powers, is a gaping hole that should not exist.

[Sarcastr0]

Plenty of examples of lack of strong institutions leading to very bad things as well.

[Krayt]

Yes. Grant the chancellor emergency powers rather than have rigorous requirements.

[Sarcastr0]

Or grant Caesar dictatorial powers and see the Republic fall.

It's almost as though things are not simple.

[Ed Grinberg]

Nazi Germany had amazingly "strong institutions" -- strong enough for Hitler & Co. to suppress all opposition and then proceed to implement their "final solution" to Germany's problems.

[Nige]

Great to see the 'turning into Nazi Germany' trope flipped with the new administration, but the US has its own history of oppression that might it might be more worthwhile to examine. Voter suppression, for example.

[Nige]

Didn't we just have court packing?

[Brett Bellmore]

No, we didn't. Claims that filling empty seats was "court packing" are just intended to reduce the outrage when Democrats actually go ahead and create empty seats to fill.

[Nige]

So, yes, we had court packing in the sense that any non-Trumpian would understand it.

[Brett Bellmore]

In a sense nobody would have called "court packing" before the Democratic party distributed the talking point.

[Queen Amalthea]

Yeah, that was totally normal, nothing unusual or extreme about it at all. You just had Lindsey Graham say 'hold this against me if I do it in the future' and then he totally went and did the exact thing because there was no tension in it. Derpity derp.

[David Bremer]

Yeah, that was totally normal, nothing unusual or extreme about it at all.

Yes, if you look historically, that is how it tended to operate. It's not quite unanimous, but fully consistent with past practices.

[Queen Amalthea]

Sure thing, when Graham said 'hold me to it' and then had to explain himself that was because there was no tension in his positions. Sure.

[David Bremer]

I mean, you can actually look this stuff up: https://www.nationalreview.com/2020/08/history-is-on-the-side-of-republicans-filling-a-supreme-court-vacancy-in-2020/

Yes, he said "hold me to it." And yes, there is tension. Doesn't change the fact that the resolution was consistent with past practices.

[Sarcastr0]

The new definition of court-packing was entirely a creation of the right during Obama.

Awkward to turn back now that it's no longer useful to you.

[TwelveInchPianist]

"The new definition of court-packing was entirely a creation of the right during Obama."

Do you have a cite for that? I'd be shocked if it weren't used hyperbolically by anybody of either side who worried that the court's balance was going to the other side.

But the real meaning of the term is to refer to what FDR tried to do, and people who argue otherwise are being disingenuous.

[Sarcastr0]

https://www.nationalreview.com/bench-memos/no-court-packing-ammon-simon/

[Nige]

You voted for Trump just so you could get the courts packed.

[Alpheus W Drinkwater]

Yeah, but that's different.

[Krayt]

So, yes, we had court packing in the sense that any non-Trumpian would understand it.

Court packing has a well-defined meaning. You should be ashamed of yourself for repeating this idiotic sophistry, textbook definition.

[De Oppresso Liber]

Keeping a SC seat empty for a year was .... fill in the blank.

[Krayt]

Not court packing. And in any case, the Republicans should have had the balls to bring it to the floor then voted him down directly.

[De Oppresso Liber]

So it's called "not court packing"? Is that a German compound word?

[Krayt]

It's nasty politics, but the rhetoric is idiotic and fraudulent to call it court packing. Come up with your own phrase.

But these are the same lying frauds who call letting you keep your own money as "subsidizing" you, in Obi-Wan's deservedly laughable "from a certain point of view."

[Nige]

You had a yeehawin kneeslappin rootin tootin courtpackinero.

[De Oppresso Liber]

I'm sorry, but is "court-packing" in the dictionary? No? Then you can keep your opinion, and I can keep mine, thank you. And for what it's worth, this author at Rutgers U. agrees with me: https://www.rutgers.edu/news/what-court-packing.

"What does it mean to pack the courts, is it the appropriate response and would it make the courts less of a partisan battleground issue?

People often use "court packing" to describe changes to the size of the Supreme Court, but it's better understood as any effort to manipulate the Court's membership for partisan ends. A political party that's engaged in court packing will usually violate norms that govern who is appointed (e.g., only appoint jurists who respect precedent) and how the appointment process works (e.g., no appointments during a presidential election)."

This seems like yet another focus on semantics rather than the issue, which is the GOP go-to tactic when their hypocrisy is being laid bare.

[TwelveInchPianist]

"People often use “court packing” to describe changes to the size of the Supreme Court, but it’s better understood as any effort to manipulate the Court’s membership for partisan ends..."

Why is that better? There's a distinct difference between enlarging the court and using the appointment and advise and consent powers to manipulate the courts membership.

Expanding the court allows the political branches to game the outcome of individual cases, and destroys the independence of the court. People who want to use "court packing" to cover normal political appointments are blurring that disingenuously blurring that distinction.

[De Oppresso Liber]

Again, what was normal about leaving a SC seat open for a year, and then disregarding the supposed justification for that move to appoint another SC justice when the opportunity arose?

Certainly not "normal". Nor were many of Trump's appointments to lower courts. Trump appointed more unqualified judges than previous presidents, according to the American Bar Association. In fact, Trump, with his usual thin skin and intolerance for anything less than abject worship, cut the ABA off from the information they had been using to rate judicial nominees.

Again, what part of this is "normal"?

https://ballotpedia.org/ABA_ratings_during_the_Trump_administration

[Brett Bellmore]

What was normal about it?

I suppose the fact that there's historical precedent for doing it, is what was normal about it. In fact, if you don't cherry pick by just looking at the last 50 years, you'll see that it's perfectly normal that Presidents who nominate to the Supreme court in their last year in office, with an opposition Senate, see their nominees rejected, and usually by the nominees simply being ignored.

[Kazinski]

Keeping a SC seat empty for a year was ... Politics as usual.

[Cannon]

Keeping the SC vacancy open... ment that it took 422 days until Gorsuch was confirmed which is similar to the 389 days it took for Blackmun to fill the Fortas vacancy. Yet somehow we're supposed to be think those extra days should be met with partisan court packing. Insane.

[Don Nico]

No, Nige. "Court packing" has a definite historical meaning of enlarging courts with added favorable judges.

What you mean is "court stacking." That hase been done for a very long time.

[Krayt]

The Republicans played a 40 year long game to finally get enough on the court to change things, but only now is this a problem for Democrats.

Item 73 on their list of "We're shocked, shocked! that they use our own weapons against us!c

[Nige]

It's weird that the 40 year long game to get ideologues in the courts is a Democrat weapon even as you are describing is Republicans doing it.

[jb]

Okay, so we had "violation of norms not embodied in the Constitution to get to a particular partisan composition of the Court", of which "court packing" is one particular example not meaningfully different from the others.

[Queen Amalthea]

What is the supposedly awful thing that is about to happen?

This gets me about conservative extremists (but I repeat myself) these days. What is so terrible about now? It seems like a fantastically great time to me. Do you want to go back to before incorporation of the Bill of Rights to the states? To segregation? To when women couldn't vote? To when gay persons were regularly discriminated against and abused? To when books like James Joyce's were regularly unavailable? WTF?

[Queen Amalthea]

I mean, even for conservatives this is a uniquely fine time. Public unions are hampered, affirmative action is on the ropes, the 2nd Amendment applies to the states now, money is speech. None of that was true twenty years ago. Rejoice dude!

I think there has to be a 'the end is near' mentality for conservative extremists (but I repeat myself) because it makes it easier for them to live with the anti-democratic measures they increasingly bank on. I mean, if it's that or the end of the Republic its so much easier justified...

[James Pollock]

It is NOT an ideal time for the Conservatives. Cats and dogs live openly in the same households, and attempts to enshrine a state religion are still rebuffed on the lame notion that the Constitution precludes it (never mind that the founder of the religion itself also did so.)
They've never been so oppressed before in all of history.

[Brian Thomas]

Don't forget women still get to make medical decisions for themselves despite God saying they can't.

[Krayt]

"Money is speech"

The first amendment forbids regulating what speech may be mass produced and distributed. Are you in favor of allowing the printing of anything, just restricting, by cutting money, how many copies can be made?

Why are you in accordance with kings and dictators who love that backdoor censorship method?

[De Oppresso Liber]

Huh? How about we just regulate political campaign contributions to strict individual limits, no fictional entities as donors, and complete transparency in donation origins and use?

It seems disingenuous to try to twist the very specific desires to have transparency in money in politics with broad speech by private citizens.

[Brett Bellmore]

That's not what they keep trying to do, though, is it?

Citizens United wasn't about a campaign donation, after all, it was independent speech concerning a candidate. And the Deputy SG argued before the Court that they could ban books, too, as long as they related to an election. Repeatedly questioned on the topic, and stuck to his guns.

Well, the actual Solicitor General thought that was a little extreme, and said that, while the law would allow them to ban books, they'd never done it. Pamphlets, on the other hand, would be fair game.

The name of that SG? Elena Kagan.

"JUSTICE GINSBURG: “May I ask you one question that was highlighted in the prior argument, and that was if congress could say no TV and radio ads, could it also say no newspaper ads, no campaign biographies? Last time the answer was, yes, congress could, but it didn't. Is that -- is that still the government's answer?” ELENA KAGAN, Solicitor General: “The government's answer has changed, Justice Ginsburg. . . .the government’s view is that although 441b does cover full-length books . . . the FEC has never applied 441b in that context.” … CHIEF JUSTICE ROBERTS: “We don't put our First Amendment rights in the hands of FEC bureaucrats; and if you say that you are not going to apply it to a book, what about a pamphlet?” GENERAL KAGAN: “I think a -- a pamphlet would be different. A pamphlet is pretty classic electioneering, so there is no attempt to say that 441 b only applies to video and not to print.” "

[Nige]

Why are you in favour of dark money and wealthy donors exercising influence over political parties?

[OtisAH]

Yes, they want all those things.

[Armchair Lawyer]

I wouldn't worry about it.

In order to court pack, they'd need 50 Senators. And I don't think they have it.

To court pack on such a thin majority? Nope

[Queen Amalthea]

Indeed. When the future is dependent on Joe freakin' Manchin's worldview and conservative extremists (but I repeat myself) see the end it says more about them than anything else.

[Armchair Lawyer]

If you want to have Manchin switch parties to the GOP, the GOP is more than willing to take him.

[Queen Amalthea]

You misunderstand, I'm not criticizing Manchin, I'm saying any conservative extremist (but I repeat myself) who sees the end of the world because his worldview is going to reign is saying more about themselves than anyone else.

[Kevin Smith]

Do you have a macro for that or do you type it out each time?

[Queen Amalthea]

It's fun to write.

[Brett Bellmore]

Packing the Court does not require 50 Senators. It requires 50% +1 of the Senators present. If you had 51 Senators present, a quorum, you could pack the Court with 26 votes.

If they really intend to pack the Court, they can do it, and Manchin can't stop them. All they have to do is pass it through the House, and then rush through a vote when not everybody is present.

Sure, it would cause a big stink. Packing the Court will cause a big stink no matter how they accomplish it.

Now, granted, they'll have to nuke the filibuster first. But, same reasoning applies: They don't need Manchin's vote to nuke the filibuster, if they just do it while some of the Senators are absent.

[Queen Amalthea]

Well, they could just have the requisite number of Senators killed too to get your scenario...

It's about as likely.

I think this is really in 'every accusation is a confession' territory. Conservative extremists (but I repeat myself) like Brett likely often wish their party would do something like this, so they also fear the other party is on the verge of doing it.

Don't worry my conservative extremist (but I repeat myself) friend, not everyone is as ideological as you.

[Armchair Lawyer]

No, that's less likely.

Quorum tactics have been used before in this country, on multiple occasions.

But something high profile like this?

[Brett Bellmore]

They never do anything that hasn't been done before, until they do.

Yes, I think they'll shortly start resorting to quorum tactics.

[Queen Amalthea]

Then they'll burn down Congress and use it to take power I guess.

Extremists of course think everyone else is as extreme as they are.

[Brett Bellmore]

Yeah, you'll notice how my side keeps controversial omnibus bills taking over huge chunks of the economy or election administration, on straight party line votes.

[Queen Amalthea]

Truly those were days the Republic fell.

[NonLawyerDan]

So, if they don't resort to quorum tactics over the next, say, 4 years, what changes in your beliefs will that lead to?

[NonLawyerDan]

Brett, the above was meant for you.

[Brett Bellmore]

I'll decide they're less fanatical than I thought.

And if they do resort to them? Will that change your opinions?

[NonLawyerDan]

Absolutely. And I'd be shocked. Then I'd try to push for changes in the electoral system that could result in a third party. (Step 1: ranked-choice voting. Step 2: multi-member districts. Start within states.)

[NonLawyerDan]

I just can't see how you really think this is remotely likely. I'd have to give packing the court or changing the filibuster via quorum tactics a 1% or so chance.

[ThePublius]

"Conservative extremists (but I repeat myself)"

So you are saying that all conservatives are extremists. Got it. You realize that, in of itself, is an extreme view, don't you? Or, just a cheap shot at people you don't agree with. Tiresome either way. And stupid.

[Nige]

You all voted for Trump didn't you? The second time.

[Sarcastr0]

There are normal conservatives in this commentariat. (DMN, NToJ, and the like)

You call them TDS liberals.

[James Pollock]

"So you are saying that all conservatives are extremists. Got it."

They didn't used to be. Their current state is whose fault? They've gone through purge after purge of throwing out the insufficiently pure for being "RINO".

[ThePublius]

You three are quite juvenile in your responses. Either you really believe what you're saying, which would be quite pitiful, or you are cynical enough to brand people you don't agree with in order to blunt their opposition.

"Conservatives" are not a homogeneous group or block, are not identified as belonging to a particular party, not voting for or supporting a particular candidate.

And no, I didn't call anyone "TDS liberals." They didn't all vote for Trump. And there was no "purge," there couldn't be, as they are not an organized group or party.

How stupid.

[Queen Amalthea]

Publius is a great example of what I'm talking about, a guy who gets his conservatism from Epoch Times more than Russell Kirk. Conservatism is basically the John Birch Society now.

[ThePublius]

You are ridiculous.

[Queen Amalthea]

Do you have an Epoch Times article to back that up?

[Sarcastr0]

What do you call Prof. Somin?

[Commenter_XY]

A law professor. 🙂

[De Oppresso Liber]

I was a republican. Elected as precinct committee officer, volunteered in local campaigns, the whole bit.

I have been purged. Self-purged, but gone all the same. The party is made up of superstitious and ignorant, hateful dummies. That is all that is left. Those are the only people who could stomach the party dropping its mission statement in favor of a condition-less loyalty pledge to Trump.

The GOP is a personality cult. Read any recent papers on the GOP from political scientists. It is not even a topic up for debate; it is a given.

[Dr. Ed 2]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_50-gOeBilc

[De Oppresso Liber]

You think this is a rebuttal, or even funny? You guys got too stupid to hang out with. That's not something to brag about.

[NonLawyerDan]

Who cares about funny, it's just a good song.
Patty Smyth is married to John McEnroe?!!

[Nige]

Lol offended at conservatives being called extreme. You drove the moderate conservatives out and away a while ago.

[Armchair Lawyer]

"Sure, it would cause a big stink. "

Using THOSE sorts of tactics to pack the court? Quorum tactics? On a bare majority? In an era of proxy voting?

No....It wouldn't fly.

[Queen Amalthea]

Of course it wouldn't.

But when you obsess about screwing other people's wives you're also going to obsess that someone is going to screw yours. Hence, Brett.

[Dr. Ed 2]

Or it would touch off the second civil war -- and that's part of why Trump backed down.

[Nige]

'the second civil war '

Drink!

[De Oppresso Liber]

Maybe choosing to engage in repeated bad faith maneuvers and outright lies culminating in a sloppy sedition attempt that they now cover up for and minimize will have consequences.

The horrors!

[Dr. Ed 2]

"Looks to me like we’re now entering the end game for the Constitution and America as we knew it. I’m expecting either a Switch in Time, or Court packing, in the next few years."

I don't think that President B>can be President much longer, the neurological stuff can't be hidden anymore, and Harris is going to have to step in under the 25th Amendment.

That removes her from the Senate, creating a true 50-50 divide, where the motion is defeated. So any move to either pack the court or confirm the packees can be defeated. Likewise any confirmation of a new VeeP.

There's got to be a morning after
If we can hold on through to January 2023
We have a chance to find the sunshine
Let's keep on looking for the right.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bcLazPauA1c

[grb]

Nostradamus Ed strikes again! In recent weeks he's foreseen an imminent Second Civil War, oncoming nuclear holocaust, and now the (umpteenth) prediction of Biden's mental collapse. ( Ed also did some weird thing about massive social upheaval caused by transgendered athletes, but I can no longer reconstruct the sense of it )

Two things :

1. Give Ed credit : His various futures are never boring.

2. On the last day of Biden's second term will he still be 25th Amendment predicting? Anyone recall when the Right-types here said Biden would never debate Trump? Will they be back next week with breathless rumors that Biden's presser was CGI special effects ?!?

[Dr. Ed 2]

Did you see that loser trying to speak in complete sentences -- and failing? And this was with essentially prepackaged questions that he had been prepared to answer.

Scary....

Between the border crisis and the exploding inflation issue (prices of basic commodities such as food & fuel are going up, fast) -- things will get interesting.

[Queen Amalthea]

"Did you see that loser trying to speak in complete sentences — and failing?"

The chutzpah of a Trump supporter writing this is amazing.

[grb]

From a campaign speech given by Donald Trump in July 2015 :

“Look, having nuclear—my uncle was a great professor
and scientist and engineer, Dr. John Trump at MIT; good
genes, very good genes, OK, very smart, the Wharton
School of Finance, very good, very smart —you know, if
you’re a conservative Republican, if I were a liberal, if,
like, OK, if I ran as a liberal Democrat, they would say I’m
one of the smartest people anywhere in the world—it’s
true!—but when you’re a conservative Republican they
try—oh, do they do a number—that’s why I always start
off: Went to Wharton, was a good student, went there,
went there, did this, built a fortune—you know I have to
give my like credentials all the time, because we’re a little
disadvantaged—but you look at the nuclear deal, the
thing that really bothers me—it would have been so easy,
and it’s not as important as these lives are (nuclear is
powerful; my uncle explained that to me many, many
years ago, the power and that was 35 years ago; he
would explain the power of what’s going to happen and
he was right—who would have thought?), but when you
look at what’s going on with the four prisoners—now it
used to be three, now it’s four—but when it was three and
even now, I would have said it’s all in the messenger;
fellas, and it is fellas because, you know, they don’t, they
haven’t figured that the women are smarter right now
than the men, so, you know, it’s gonna take them about
another 150 years—but the Persians are great negotiators,
the Iranians are great negotiators, so, and they, they just
killed, they just killed us.”

[swood1000]

I’m expecting either a Switch in Time, or Court packing, in the next few years.

If it is to be a Switch in Time, who do you think is most likely to switch and what issue(s) would qualify as important enough to justify that designation? Who besides Roberts would be in the running?

[Brett Bellmore]

Roberts is pretty much a given, Thomas a given in the opposite direction. That leaves us with Barrett, Gorsuch, Kavanaugh, and Alito.

Barrett is something of an unknown at this point, promising record on the lower courts, but Justices often change once they're on the Court.

I think I'd say Gorsuch, based on the Title VII ruling last year. But possibly Barrett, given her lack of a Supreme court track record.

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

The important point is to recognize that conservative have not won, are not winning, and will not win in America, not over time.

Everything else is just blather and lather.

[James Pollock]

This time, for sure, the world ends.
People predicting the world ending have a very poor accuracy percentage. But this time, this one's the one.

[Armchair Lawyer]

One of the more interesting decisions was the Obama administration's failure to sue Google in 2012 due to antitrust violations. Google would go on to abuse its monopoly status in a number of ways.

https://www.politico.com/news/2021/03/16/google-files-ftc-antitrust-investigation-475573

However, given the Obama administration (and current Biden administration's) close ties with Silicon Valley, coupled with Google's ability to "skew" election results through selective algorithms, we have ask a question. Was a "backroom" deal in place between Google and the Obama-Biden Democrats? Don't due Google, and we'll help you win elections?

[Armchair Lawyer]

"Sue, not due"

[Queen Amalthea]

Conservatives sudden embrace of regulation and anti-trust (now that they think it will hamper entities they see 'on the other side') is exhibit A in partisanship over principle.

[Armchair Lawyer]

The GOP started antitrust. Literally. It's not a bad word, and it's appropriate to use when monopolistic business practices threaten free markets.

I'd be more concerned about the Democrats sudden embrace of "Big Tech".

[Queen Amalthea]

I hate to break it to you but a lot has changed since Taft dude.

Are you 25 or younger? Because us adults remember when Bork's writings about anti-trust were big in conservative circles. What's up with the switch? The Big Tech is being mean to us! is what's up. Hell of a principle to live on...

[Armchair Lawyer]

The last really big antitrust breakup was AT&T. It happened in 1982.

Care to guess which party controlled the administration then?

[Queen Amalthea]

I'm curious how far up this hill you're willing to charge. Do you want to claim that conservative thought wasn't very critical of anti-trust regulatory action until recently? Because you'll easily be shown wrong. Just admit you are buying in to a recent fad because your Orange Leader and other conservative extremists (but I repeat myself) think 'Big Tech' is being mean to them. There would be more dignity in it.

[Armchair Lawyer]

That's right....it was the Reagan administration.

Meanwhile, in the largest potential anti-trust investigation since AT&T, Obama officials surprisingly said "No....not gonna"

And then suddenly the new Biden administration is full of all these Silicon Valley types....

[Queen Amalthea]

OK, let's get you on the record then (Jesus). Do you claim that conservative and libertarian thought has not been, until quite recently, very critical of vigorous anti trust regulatory action?

[Queen Amalthea]

I imagine AL is busy googling to see what conservatives used to believe.

Living in an ever changing present created by Sean Hannity and Laura Ingraham must be a true hell.

[Armchair Lawyer]

Here's some reading for you. It's not a left/right divide necessarily.

https://www.cato.org/sites/cato.org/files/serials/files/regulation/2018/6/regulation-v41n2-2.pdf

[Queen Amalthea]

Holy shit, after your googling you really came up with a 2018 document.

I'll ask again, are you 25 or younger? Because at least your approach would make some sense if the answer is yes.

There's a very long and easily documented hostility to vigorous anti-trust regulatory action on the right. You're in a recent fad dude. Again, there would be more dignity in admitting to it than what you're doing now.

[Armchair Lawyer]

It's a document from a historical perspective, especially in regards to the AT&T breakup.

"There’s a very long and easily documented hostility to vigorous anti-trust regulatory action on the right"

Do you have any real evidence of this?

[Queen Amalthea]

Look, I was a self identified 'conservative' for a long time. Heck, where I adjunct I'm still to the right of just about everyone. I voted for Hogan and gave money to him. I still am to the right of most folks on affirmative action, immigration, taxes, etc.

If you want to say 'hey, us conservatives were wrong for so long about anti-trust and people like Liz Warren and Noam Chomsky were right' then there would be some dignity to that. But pretending that this isn't a big shift brought about by very recent concerns pushed by the Orange God is fooling yourself more than anything.

[Queen Amalthea]

"Do you have any real evidence of this?"

Holy shit, you really don't know.

I mean, again, living in an ever changing present created by Sean Hannity and Laura Ingraham must be a real hell. I actually pity you.

Maybe google this guy named 'Robert Bork' or something. Used to be big in conservative circles back in your grandfather's time...

[Armchair Lawyer]

Looks like that's a no, you don't have evidence.

Well, that was fun. Gotta go.

[Queen Amalthea]

In law school everyone reads Bork and other conservatives on anti-trust. They saw a very limited role for those laws. For example, you might think the NFL is a 'monopoly' because there is no real pro football competitor near them, but Bork and other libertarian/conservatives argued not so fast, you shouldn't compare the NFL to just football leagues but rather to all other forms of entertainment. That anti-trust laws should be used sparingly because markets deal with supposed 'monopolies' is a long standing conservative/libertarian view.

If you get your conservatism from Laura Ingraham instead of Russel Kirk or Milton Friedman I can understand how you may have missed this.

[NToJ]

@Armchair,

"Do you have any real evidence of this?"

You mean besides the Reagan administration's famous hostility to antitrust laws...?

[NToJ]

Can't believe we have to show the receipts! Nobody who has taken an antitrust class or knows anything about antitrust in the last 20-30 years would pretend that this was debatable. Go read a fucking book.

[Armchair Lawyer]

NTOJ,

You know it was the Reagan administration where ultimately AT&T was broken up....right? "Famous Hostility".

Meanwhile, the Obama-Biden administration has been remarkably "passive" towards Google and other Tech monopolies..

So, if we're comparing the two....

[Queen Amalthea]

Good grief, that's as stupid as saying 'the Reagan administration once enforced the NLRA so that shows conservatives have always been pro-union!

Again, there would be more dignity in you just admitting 'I am ignorant of what conservatives may have believed about anti-trust in the past, but some recent concerns I have have me thinking it might be a good idea.'

[NToJ]

Armchair,

"You know it was the Reagan administration where ultimately AT&T was broken up….right? “Famous Hostility”."

The divestiture began in November 1974 when, in the infancy of Ford's administration, his DOJ filed the original divestiture action. (Safe bet that this action was initiated in the Nixon administration.) Jimmy Carter's administration than carried it through 1981. The eight-year litigation came to an end during the Reagan administration, when it accepted AT&T's proposal to self-regulate and breakup (much to the chagrin of Caspar Weinberger and Malcolm Baldridge, who were opposed to doing anything).

It's also kind of a weird example to bandy about as a famous instance of conservative regulation. This was not the Reagan administration decoupling some purely private entity. Ma Bell was not a traditionally growing natural monopoly. It was functionally a regulated utility. The FCC (which was overtly hostile to competition) functionally took over regulation of the Bell in the 30s and used it to promote the FCC's anti-competition position.

This is a very good example of you having read some simplistic waft of shit somewhere, probably titled something like "The Right Hasn't Always Been Hostile to Antitrust, See Reagan!", and then running with it here without appreciating the same nuance that whomever you stole from missed. If you want to know about a natural monopoly that the Reagan administration famously protected, google their 1982 dismissal of the over-a-decade old antitrust lawsuit against IBM.

"Meanwhile, the Obama-Biden administration has been remarkably “passive” towards Google and other Tech monopolies.."

Setting aside that Google is not a monopoly, and I don't know what other "Tech monopolies" you think exist, you do not have to guess about the Obama Administration's purported passivity in antitrust law. The DOJ keeps historical lists of all their antitrust filings. Here are the numbers of DOJ filings per administration:

Biden Administration: Zero.
Trump Administration: ~170 (one term)
Obama Administration: >600
W Bush Administration: >440
Clinton Administration: >510
HW Bush Administration: ~50 (one term)
Reagan Administration: 90

Call me old fashioned, but this kind of data probably provides better evidence of the overall antitrust tendencies of any given administration than some anecdote you aren't comprehending from 1982.

[NToJ]

PLEASE NOTE that I agree with the Reagan and HW Bush administration's position re: antitrust. And I disagree with the more aggressive enforcement under Presidents Obama and Clinton.

[NToJ]

Also not for nothing, President Obama's DOJ did file two antitrust lawsuits against Google in 2010 and 2011.

[James Pollock]

The antitrust case that should have come would have broken Microsoft into at least two companies, one that sold operating systems and another than sold productivity software. Not sure which half, if either, would dabble in hardware. Might have totally pre-empted the Zune, but MS would probably still have tried to launch an MS-branded tablet, after seeing how profitable the iPad was for Apple.

[NToJ]

"That’s right….it was the Reagan administration."

Yes, notorious, uh, enemy of monopolization in business *checks notes* William F. Baxter...?

In my view, Baxter was correct in his "benign neglect" approach to antitrust law, since the political left of the era thought everything was a fucking antitrust violation. But let's not pretend that he was a warrior of breaking up big business.

[Armchair Lawyer]

A "Warrior"? No. But not opposed to it, as AT&T shows.

Google currently operates in much the same position AT&T did. But The Obama-Biden administration took a hard pass on breaking it up.

And now, the Biden administration is full of "Big Tech" people....

[Queen Amalthea]

A big problem with replacing a political philosophy with a moody Orange buffoon is that you have to defend things 'conservatives have long championed vigorous anti-trust enforcement!'

[NToJ]

You don't know what the fuck you are talking about.

[Sarcastr0]

AL should be ashamed, but the Internet has freed us from such concerns about going off despite ignorance.

[Armchair Lawyer]

NTOJ,

That's because you're not actually reading what's being said. What's being said is that it was very odd for Obama's DoJ to drop the Google antitrust lawsuit in 2012.

Now Queen's rebuttal here is (paraphrased) "Ah hah, NOW the GOP wants antitrust, they never want antitrust, they're SUPER-antitrust, but now it suits them!"

But that's not actually true. The GOP, even under Nixon/Ford/Reagan DID do antitrust lawsuits. Not as commonly as the Democrats did, but they definately did them. You show evidence there in your table. It clearly didn't drop to zero, or even less than 10 cases. Now the GOP believed in only using antitrust lawsuits when needed for sure...they thought Democrats overused antitrust lawsuits, as a when to demonstrate government control over private industry. But to say the GOP NEVER would use antitrust is inaccurate. And in high profile cases, with clear monopolistic behavior in a tech-communications industry, like AT&T, it was done.

But like I said, the Democrats "love" antitrust. They like using it to exert government power over private industry. And the Google lawsuit was easily the biggest antitrust case since Microsoft, if not AT&T itself. Clear monopolistic behavior. And the Democrats who love antitrust are in charge. And then....the case is dropped. A whole bunch of predictions by Obama-Biden economists turn out to be dead wrong. Google uses its monopoly to absolutely dominate the mobile search market. Why would this case be dropped?

What's odder? The tech elite start "skewing" search results and feed results towards Democrats. Google, Facebook, Twitter. Google already noted it could alter elections by skewing search results. And here it is doing it... And right after the Obama-Biden Democrats strangely drop an antitrust lawsuit against Google. And then you get a flood of Silicon Valley execs into the Biden administration.

So here's the question. Did Google and the Obama-Biden democrats cut a deal. No antitrust enforcement against Google, and in exchange Google would use their monopoly power help the Democrats win elections? And BTW, that type of monopoly power is exactly why antitrust exists...

OR, let's use the AT&T example

Imagine if Reagan just dropped the AT&T case in 1982. AT&T stayed intact. And then suddenly AT&T started "dropping" calls from Democrats in 1988, while GOP calls remained fine. Democratic calls for donations from call centers just suddenly didn't work. Then a horde of AT&T executives entered the Bush I administration

What would you think happened?

[James Pollock]

""And now, the Biden administration is full of “Big Tech” people…."

Who put Ajit Pai on the FCC?

[Sarcastr0]

1. Google is not a monopoly. It relies on network effects.

2. The GOP allowing antitrust lawsuits is not the same as thinking they're policy. You're trying for new goalposts.

The tech elite start “skewing” search results and feed results towards Democrats. Google, Facebook, Twitter. Google already noted it could alter elections by skewing search results. And here it is doing it… And right after the Obama-Biden Democrats strangely drop an antitrust lawsuit against Google. And then you get a flood of Silicon Valley execs into the Biden administration.

Your techno-thriller novel sucks.

[NToJ]

Armchair,

There was no dropped antitrust lawsuit. It never started. Because it was idiotic in the first place. Google isn’t a monopoly. There’s no deal to be struck because in neither 2012 nor today is there any serious antitrust case against Google. (There have been smaller ones relating to mergers.)

The entire conspiracy theory is childishly dumb. Google conspired with the Obama Admin because they knew after Hillary lost in 2016, Joe Biden would run in 2020? We’re they asleep in 2016?

The simple explanation is that President Trump’s DOJ filed a frivolous lawsuit against a perceived political foe and there are a typical number of Silicon Valley execs in the Biden admin because it’s normal, filthy regulatory capture.

There’s nothing that can or can’t happen which you couldn’t fit into your conspiracy. It’s boring.

[Armchair Lawyer]

NTOJ,

"Google is not a monopoly"

Seriously? You're in denial. You really believe Google isn't a monopoly?

[Sarcastr0]

Walk us through it, AL. What is the definition of a monopoly, and how does Google fit the criteria?

[James Pollock]

"Seriously? You’re in denial. You really believe Google isn’t a monopoly?"
Let's turn this around the other way.
In what market(s) does Google offer the only product?
Search? Nope. Turns out the competition is extremely well-funded.
OS for smartphones? Nope. that competition is also extremely vigorous with the main competition quite well-funded.
Video publishing on the Internet? Nope. The competition is allegedly backed by the Chinese government.
So what do they monopolize?

[James Pollock]

"Google currently operates in much the same position AT&T did."

By which you mean Google Fiber directly competes with AT&T Fiber?

[NToJ]

Google is not a monopoly. Please answer Sarcastro’s Q

[Dr. Ed 2]

In fairness, 1982 was when AT&T was settled.

Wasn't it filed under Carter?

[Armchair Lawyer]

Earlier.

[Don Nico]

In the end that break-up destroyed (in a practical sense) the foremost private sector research organization in the physical and engineering sciences.

[Voize of Reazon]

It destroyed Xerox PARC?

[Don Nico]

No it effectively destroyed Bell Labs

[Voize of Reazon]

I don't use smiley faces because I find them cutesy and a little pathetic, but I do occasionally pay a price for adhering to such principles.

[Sarcastr0]

You may know better than I, but I thought Bell Labs' model was already well on it's way out by then.

No argument re: 'the foremost private sector research organization in the physical and engineering sciences.'

[Don Nico]

You're right; the model was "on the way" out at many companies. But Bell Labs was still extremely well supported an going strong.

[Bored Lawyer]

Perhaps. The challenges posed by the most recent high-tech monopolization are different from the classic anti-trust law. At its core, the issue is not economic, but communication and political philosophy. You can call it the "marketplace of ideas," to coin a phrase. (Whoops. Someone beat me to it.)

We are in a situation where a few very large corporations can act together and control what is considered appropriate or inappropriate speech and advocacy. They literally can deplatform a group or person that disagrees with them, relegating them to technologies from the last century.

And it is not only conservatives that are disturbed by this. Sen. Bernie Sanders is, and one cannot call him a conservative with a straight face.

The anti-trust laws were not designed for this situation. What the remedy is, I don't know. But it is worth a discussion, and I don't think it is a betrayal of principle to raise it, notwithstanding prior narrowing of anti-trust laws in a different context.

[NToJ]

"At its core, the issue is not economic, but communication and political philosophy."

I agree with Bored Lawyer that whatever invented problems there are with Big Tech have nothing to do with antitrust law or economics.

[Nige]

Amazon employees having to pee in bottles?

[NToJ]

Nothing to do with antitrust law.

[Nige]

But it really ought to be against some law.

[James Pollock]

The purity in bottles act?

[Bob from Ohio]

"Conservatives sudden embrace of regulation and anti-trust (now that they think it will hamper entities they see ‘on the other side’) is exhibit A in partisanship over principle."

Times change, one has to adjust.

Speaking of partisanship over principle, "Kids in cages" last year, not now.

[Nige]

What are you talking about? Biden's being excoriated for what's happening at the border by the same people who deplored Trump's policies. I think it's a bit apples and oranges - a shoddy system overwhelmed rather than deliberate evil policy, but either way it has to be fixed.

[James Pollock]

" Google would go on to abuse its monopoly status in a number of ways."

Google isn't a monopoly. So that would be a neat trick.

[Dr. Ed 2]

Look up how "monopoly" is defined in the Sherman Act...

[NToJ]

Uh, yea if y'all want to see how the Sherman Act "defined" "monopoly" you can see the original text here. Like Dr. Ed 2, you will be surprised to find out that the Sherman Act does not define the term "monopoly" at all, since that word is not contained in the original text. Nor does it define "monopolize" (which is used).

[Sarcastr0]

Appealing to an authority he clearly knows nothing about? That's Ed!

[James Pollock]

the only authority Dr. Ed appeals to is Dr. Ed himself.

[NToJ]

"One of the more interesting decisions was the Obama administration’s failure to sue Google in 2012 due to antitrust violations."

It would have been interesting (and unusual) for the Obama administration to sure Google in 2012 for antitrust violations for the reason that Google did not violate antitrust laws in 2012.

[Armchair Lawyer]

That's not what the lawyers thought.

[NToJ]

You mean that's not what some lawyers in the FTC thought 9 years ago, based on your extensive review of a Politico article? In fairness to the lawyers who did think a lawsuit should issue, they were Obama-era lawyers which means they probably didn't know anything about antitrust. It was just good fortune that the FTC leadership still had some Republicans in it to squash the pointless investigation that would have postponed the massive consumer benefits we all enjoy when technology and private industry is left alone from government intrusion.

[Sarcastr0]

I couldn't disagree with NToJ more on the right policy re: Google, but I completely agree with him that you're speaking from ignorance with confidence you do not deserve AL.

[Queen Amalthea]

OK, so if we can't have background checks for private gun sales how about this: strict liability for private gun sellers but that's vitiated if a background check was done. So, freedom to give your cousin or neighbor a gun, but responsibility for it too.

[Armchair Lawyer]

Only if you do the same for cars and computers.

[Queen Amalthea]

That's ridiculous. Guns are not cars and computers, they are weapons. It's like selling a tiger (not even as bad though, tigers aren't inherently a weapon).

Don't insult mine or worse your intelligence. You know the difference. If I threatened you you wouldn't go get a computer or a car, but you might sensibly get a gun.

[Armchair Lawyer]

Cars can be just as much a weapon as guns, and cars kill many more innocent people than guns do.

If you give your teenage daughter a car, and then she kills a pedestrian with it, how is that any different from giving your teenage daughter a gun which she kills someone else with?

[Queen Amalthea]

You're insulting your intelligence now. You would really grab your car keys if I threatened you? Of course not. But you might sensibly grab your gun. Because they're very different things.

I mean, get real and stop with the silly talking points. That guns are an inherent weapon is why they're important in the first place.

[Armchair Lawyer]

If you're talking about liability for lending someone a gun, then you should talk about equal liability for lending someone a car.

It's the same principle.

[Queen Amalthea]

That's like saying it's the same principle when I lend someone a kitten and a tiger. Stop being stupid.

[Armchair Lawyer]

Remember your "kitten" kills more innocent people in the US every year than your "tiger" does.

So, perhaps you should stop being "stupid".

[Queen Amalthea]

A car is not a weapon, a gun is.

We really are having this discussion. Wow.

[Armchair Lawyer]

Remember, a car can be a weapon. Quite easily. And remember, cars kill more innocent Americans every year, when compared to guns.

You seem to be deliberately missing this point.

So, if you're going to introduce a concept of legal liability for lending an object that can kill people, you should do it for all objects. Especially the one which is "more deadly"....

[Queen Amalthea]

Anything 'can' be a weapon, but actual weapons are designed to be such. This is 3rd grade stuff here.

I mean, swimming pools kill more people than dynamite, but only a fool (or conservative extremist [but I repeat myself]) thinks there is no significant difference between the two.

[Armchair Lawyer]

Listen, you introduced the concept of strict liability.

That's liability which does not depend on actual negligence or intent to harm.

And whether you kill someone with a car or a gun doesn't really matter. The person is still dead. And you lent that person that car or gun. So you're liable for the death.

[Queen Amalthea]

Strict liability makes sense when you have an inherently dangerous object.

Guns are designed to be a dangerous thing. That's what makes them useful for what they are for! Pretending they are not is beyond silly. You just don't want them thought of as in the natural category of dangerous objects that often trigger strict liability so you're doing this silly dance.

I like guns. I own several. I was shooting guns as young as 7 or 8. But my dad taught me, quite sensibly, that this was an inherently dangerous thing. It is made 100% to propel a projectile with destructive force. That's what makes it delightful for shooting skeet or deer and useful for stopping someone who wants to hurt you.

But pretending it's a car or a paperweight is insulting everyone's intelligence.

[Armchair Lawyer]

"Strict liability makes sense when you have an inherently dangerous object."

This may surprise you.

A car is an inherently dangerous object.

[Queen Amalthea]

That's profoundly stupid. A car *can* be dangerous just like a paperweight can be dangerous. But a gun is designed to be a dangerous thing. Thats. What. Makes. It. Useful.

Look, Wayne LaPierre makes good bumper stickers but poor philosophy.

[Armchair Lawyer]

You've moved your goalposts.

You said, and I quote "Strict liability makes sense when you have an inherently dangerous object."

A car is an inherently dangerous object.

It's designed to accelerate an object of approximately 1 ton to a speed of up to 120 mph through areas populated by many small, squishy, human bodies. It's inherently dangerous, and requires a license to operate in such areas, due to the inherent danger. Cars are additionally regulated, and have mandated a number of safety features to alleviate the inherent danger.

There's no way you can say cars aren't inherently dangerous.

[Queen Amalthea]

Cars are not designed as a destructive thing in the same way that paperweights are not. Both can be used so, but it's silly to think of them as inherently so. Guns are designed to be dangerous things, that's what makes them fun and useful *for what they are designed for.*

Again, you're in the land of thinking swimming pools and dynamite are in the same category. It's just motivated reasoning [sic].

[Dr. Ed 2]

Swimming pools are inherently dangerous -- it's why most jurisdictions require that there be a fence around them. Too many small children have wandered/fallen in and drowned.

[BadLib]

The percentage of uses of a firearm which are intended to harm a human are tiny.

I have fired a firearm many, many thousands of times. However, I have never fired a firearm in the direction of a human. With one exception, none of my uses of a firearm have harmed anyone. (That exception being slightly injuring myself when I got my hand too close to the slide when firing a .380 ACP AMT Backup - ouch!).

However, I've been involved in a number of automobile accidents over the years - some with injuries to humans.

I suspect my experiences fairly closely mirror those of the vast majority of firearm owners (except, perhaps, in how many rounds they have fired).

[James Pollock]

"A car is an inherently dangerous object. "

It is not. On TV, they explode at slightest impact, but the real ones hardly ever do.
A car is a potentially dangerous object, because it can accelerate to a dangerous speed but to be really dangerous, it needs to be negligently operated.

[James Pollock]

"The percentage of uses of a firearm which are intended to harm a human are tiny."

That's debatable.

"However, I’ve been involved in a number of automobile accidents over the years – some with injuries to humans."

In approximately what percentage were you intending to harm a human?
A tiny percentage, isn't it?
Now don't you feel embarrassed, for thinking that was a good argument?

[Brett Bellmore]

No, that's not "debatable". Almost all ammunition is expended at the range or hunting. Shooting at a paper target isn't intended to harm anyone by any sane definition.

[James Pollock]

"No, that’s not “debatable”. Almost all ammunition is expended at the range or hunting. "

That's a shift of goalposts. You went from the percentage of uses of a firearm to percentage of uses of ammunition.
A firearm can be used to attempt to kill wildlife, or it can be used to attempt to kill burglars. That's 50/50 so far. it can also be used to interrupt a robbery, or to commit a robbery. That's 3:1 so far. Throw in your paper targets and you're still 3:2, if we ignore the fact that the main reason to practice at the range is to increase the deadliness of the weapon if it is to be used to kill a person.

[James Pollock]

"Swimming pools are inherently dangerous — it’s why most jurisdictions require that there be a fence around them."

Nope. Swimming pools have fences because they're attractive nuisances, not because they're inherently dangerous.

[Brett Bellmore]

You just want guns treated differently from every other article of property.

Well, they should be treated differently from property you don't have a constitutional right to own. Better, not worse, because owning them is a constitutional right.

[Queen Amalthea]

They are different, as you note! They are important to secure protection from things *because* they are designed to do destructive force. Pretending they are paperweights is insulting your intelligence and mine. They are inherently dangerous objects. And it makes imminent sense to attach liability to that kind of thing.

[Armchair Lawyer]

They are different. But again, CARS KILL MORE INNOCENT PEOPLE.

Design doesn't matter. The end result matters. Cars. Kill. People.

[Queen Amalthea]

Of course design matters. Again, a swimming pool and dynamite are very different things (neither is inherently bad!). Pretending they are in the same category because pools kill more people is insulting everyone's intelligence. Your doing this because a. you like guns and don't want them to be in the natural category they are because it makes you have to think about tough questions about something you like and b. you get talking points from morons like Sean Hannity or Wayne Lapierre.

[Nige]

CARS KILL MORE INNOCENT PEOPLE.

So what? Regulate gun ownership, you child.

[Kevin Smith]

Clearly the people killed by cars are less dead than those killed by guns, because cars aren't weapons

Next time I'm at the funeral of someone who died in a car accident I'll be sure to tell everyone "At least the car wasn't a weapon" I'm sure they'll find great comfort in that fact

[Nige]

Clearly you don't actually give a shit. Regulate guns.

[Queen Amalthea]

That woosh sound over your head is not a gunshot Kevin.

[Stephen Lathrop]

Armchair, in the case of pistols, any particular pistol is notably more deadly than any particular car. I do not mean that as a matter of Platonic philosophy, I mean that as a matter of mathematically measurable experience. Given this particular pistol, and this particular car, during the useful lifetime of each, the pistol is notably more likely to kill someone than the car is.

Partly that is because a typical pistol has a longer period of service than a typical car, several times longer. Partly that is because mishaps with cars are more common on a per-year basis, but on average far less deadly than shooting mishaps with pistols. Partly that is because most mishaps with cars happen inadvertently, under conditions where the operator attempts to minimize harm, while shootings with pistols are more often deliberate, with the shooter intending to maximize harm.

And of course it is worth noting that self-harm (including non-fatal injuries) by car users is more common than self-harm by pistol users, despite the horrific rate of gun suicide. The significance of that for this discussion needs a bit of unpacking.

Despite the fact that during the service life of a pistol there will be several times more cars in existence than pistols, instances of weaponized use of cars to do harm will be a tiny fraction of instances of weaponized use of pistols to do harm. Annually, the number of deaths resulting from all uses of cars, for whatever purpose, is remarkably similar to the number of deaths resulting from all uses of pistols, for whatever purpose. Incidence of use of cars for suicide is hard to gauge, but obviously far lower than incidence of pistols for suicide. Apparently, for would-be suicides, pistols are judged more reliably deadly than cars.

Thus it becomes interesting and relevant to our deadliness discussion to note how many more mishaps with cars result in someone needing medical care. The toll in medically treated injuries caused by cars per year is almost 40 times higher than that for pistols. Yet fatality numbers due to each are almost alike. That looks like a reasonable basis to suggest—at least on a per-mishap basis—that pistols are about 40 times deadlier than cars.

However, that seems an understatement—because actual instances of operation for each device are a better denominator, and that number is proportionally far higher for cars. People drive their cars and get use out of them almost daily. On average, gun owners use their guns to shoot someone less than once in a lifetime. But even with such overwhelmingly common use for cars, and such rare use for guns, the annual fatality toll for each category is remarkable similar. Reflect on that before you suggest again that cars are deadlier than guns.

Of course, you might choose to assert that a pistol gets used commonly too, as a threat, without need of actually putting it in operation. That would be unwise for this discussion, because it highlights so vividly what makes bystanders respond with repugnance to people with pistols. Bystanders do not wish to be threatened with death by pistols. They do not regard continuous use of pistols for threatening them as a social plus for pistols. Most people do not want a society predicated on order imposed by gun carriers who make frightened judgments to arm themselves continuously against mere happenstance.

Finally, there is the question of how likely it is that any particular gun user will use a gun to shoot someone, including the person with the gun. Gun enthusiasts vastly under-estimate that number. Most will say the number is vanishingly small. It isn't.

A precise number cannot be calculated, but it is easy to estimate mathematically that during the service life of any typical gun the likelihood that its owner will shoot someone (about 4 times out of 5 it will be someone else) must be somewhere between 2% and 4%. Do the calculation yourself.

First, find the number of people shot—including deaths and medically treated injuries. It runs about 140,000 per year. For this calculation—the likelihood that any particular gun owner will use a gun at some point to shoot someone—that annual shooting number increments every year. What is the service life of a gun? Do you put it at 50 years? Then take the number of people shot during that interval as 7 million.

All the shootings which happen must be accounted for by all the gun users there are. Given children too young to own guns, and the disproportionate likelihood that a gun owner who shoots someone will be male, a reasonable denominator for your calculation cannot be higher than ~ 200 million, and is probably considerably lower. What that tells you is that during a long-term interval chosen to match the service life of a gun, the likelihood that any particular male gun owner will shoot someone is somewhere between 2% and 4%, maybe higher.

The calculation based on my estimated values is that 3.5% of male gun owners will eventually shoot someone. The percentage increases if you think the actual number of male gun owners is lower than I suggest, and it increases if you think the service life of a gun is longer than I suggest.

Perhaps you say my numbers are off. Say the real numbers must be more like 250 million gun owners (an almost impossible number—in a population of 330 million it would have to include tens of millions of females on a basis of equal shooting-likelihood with males), and the service life of a gun must be 40 years, not 50. Then the percentage of both-sex gun owners who will shoot someone declines to 2.25%. It can hardly be lower than that.

At the upper extreme of likelihood, make it 125 million male gun owners, and make the gun service life 60 years. That figures to a 6.7% likelihood of shooting someone, probably too high.

I do not suggest folks are going around doing math like that. I do say many non-gun-owners probably have a more accurate intuitive feel for the magnitude of social gun risk than do gun advocates, who include too many highly motivated minimizers.

[Brett Bellmore]

"All the shootings which happen must be accounted for by all the gun users there are."

And right there you introduce the (first) mistake. You treat gun owners as interchangeable. As though we were some sort of radioactive element, with a fixed probability of committing a murder during any given time period.

Whereas the truth is that gun owners are heterogeneous. A mixture of people who have a vanishingly small probability of ever committing murder, and a tiny impurity with a very high probability.

A mixture of iron and a little bit of radium.

And worse, while the people who weren't going to use their guns wrongfully are fairly responsive to laws, the people who were going to wrongfully use them are very unresponsive.

As a result, practically everybody you'd disarm would never have done anything wrong, and practically everybody who would have done something wrong will remain armed.

[James Pollock]

"And right there you introduce the (first) mistake. You treat gun owners as interchangeable. As though we were some sort of radioactive element, with a fixed probability of committing a murder during any given time period."

You want freedom without responsibility.

[James Pollock]

"Well, they should be treated differently from property you don’t have a constitutional right to own. Better, not worse, because owning them is a constitutional right.
"

Owning anything is a Constitutional right. Guns are not special in this regard.

[Brett Bellmore]

Like printing presses, they absolutely are.

[James Pollock]

The fifth amendment says the government can't take your property, and doesn't have carveouts for printing presses OR firearms.

[Dr. Ed 2]

"You would really grab your car keys if I threatened you?"

That happens more often in domestic violence situations than you might think -- and probably more often than we know because the only version the authorities have is that of the perp.

But you're talking negligence liability as there already is criminal liability for knowingly providing someone a weapon with which to kill, and negligence liability comes to cars quite well.

[James Pollock]

"If you give your teenage daughter a car, and then she kills a pedestrian with it, how is that any different from giving your teenage daughter a gun which she kills someone else with?"

My no-longer-teenage daughter has liability insurance for the car she drives.
Liability laws for firearms are screwy because politicians for a political party keep screwing with them.

[Armchair Lawyer]

Great. Now how would you feel about having strict liability for anything your daughter did with the car?

[James Pollock]

Why would *I* have strict liability for anything my daughter does with her car? Do you understand how strict liability works? (and how it doesn't?)

[Bob from Ohio]

"My no-longer-teenage daughter has liability insurance for the car she drives."

Covers negligence only, intentional acts are not.

You want a father to be liable for criminal acts of his daughter.

[James Pollock]

"You want a father to be liable for criminal acts of his daughter."

You got that from the fact that my daughter has car insurance? Such a keen analytical mind, to suss that out.

[James Pollock]

May I assume that your daughter doesn't have car insurance, because you don't want to be liable for her criminal acts?

[Krychek_2]

Cars are in fact heavily regulated. You have to show you are willing and able to drive in a safe and responsible manner, and cars themselves are registered. I'd be more than happy with such a regime for guns.

[Armchair Lawyer]

Guns are heavily regulated as well. Probably more heavily regulated than cars are.

[Queen Amalthea]

The purpose of a car is to transport people and things from place to place.

The purpose of a gun is to fire a projectile with destructive force.

That doesn't make the latter inherently bad, in fact for many purposes it is great in my opinion. But don't insult your intelligence by pretending there is no difference there.

[Nige]

Regulate them more.

[James Pollock]

"Guns are heavily regulated as well. Probably more heavily regulated than cars are."

Depends on which state you happen to be in.

[Stephen Lathrop]

Armchair, the right vehicular comparison is not to a car. Judged on a per-use basis, the catastrophic risk of car use is far lower than gun use. You need to up the regulatory standard, to find something more comparable—something with more potential for a horrific outcome like a mass shooting.

Licensing requirements for a school bus operator fit the need: Where I live, not less than 90 days training from a state certified instructor. Two or three written exams, depending on how the bus you drive will be equipped. Finger printing and a criminal background check, the latter repeated periodically. Annual comprehensive medical exams from government-certified doctors (twice a year for older drivers). Up to 4 mandatory surprise drug tests a year, never less than one. That's before you get to the next layer of control, of the equipment, and the special licensing and inspection requirements for the people who own the equipment, train the drivers, and manage the bus yards.

I don't think the school bus standard would be reasonable as a standard to impose on all gun owners. But it would be about right for pistol owners, and low-recoil semi-automatic rifle owners using military ammunition or anything like it. Maybe the latter should at least part of the time have to practice use of their arms under military discipline, as part of a well-regulated militia. Only after they pass the annual medical exam, of course.

[Jerry B.]

Cars are not heavily regulated. You can take one to a track and drive it with no license plates or registration. Driving a car on public roads requires the driver to have a license, just as carrying concealed firearms in public generally does.

[Dr. Ed 2]

And illegal aliens have neither licenses nor insurance.

[James Pollock]

They tried to fix that in Oregon. But Republicans mounted a successful referendum drive to keep illegal immigrants from being able to obtain both licenses and insurance. Because if it's an illegal immigrant who got into an accident with your car, you don't want them to be insured.

[Bob from Ohio]

"You have to show you are willing and able to drive in a safe and responsible manner"

Big deal. Once. Then in most [all?] states never again except for half a** vision tests unless you let your license lapse.

My daughter just got her license, she had to drive around a parking lot. She has literally never driven on a highway or over 40 MPH.

What do you want to test anyway with guns? Good shooting ability? Knowldege that you shouldn't murder?

No "test" will stop a person shooting up a store or a massage parlor.

[James Pollock]

"What do you want to test anyway with guns?"
Something similar to the rifle training the USAF thought I should have in 1986.

[Stephen Lathrop]

Bob, I think imposing gun licensing requirements similar to those for school bus drivers would stop almost all mass shootings.

[NToJ]

Do you actually want cars and computers to be sold with background checks or is your objection to having guns sold with background checks (or alternatively strict liability), and your suggestion is just a rhetorical way of saying what you really want?

[Armchair Lawyer]

I'm saying strict liability, as Queen proposed, is a horrible idea.

Do you favor strict liability?

[Queen Amalthea]

If you're not sure about who you're transferring a gun to then you shouldn't be doing it.

[Armchair Lawyer]

It's a horrible concept.

Imagine, you give a gun as a present to your brother.

20 years later, through a series of events, your brother ends up shooting someone.

Under your theory, you would be liable for the shooting.

[Queen Amalthea]

If he got a background check there would be no liability at all.

You should be very careful about who you give something like that to. We want people to be so careful.

[Armchair Lawyer]

And that's ridiculous.

Your crazy policy would have people liable for murder based on an honest gift that was given decades ago.

[James Pollock]

"Your crazy policy would have people liable for murder based on an honest gift that was given decades ago."

Still having trouble reading the part that said "if he got a background check, then there would be no liability"?

[Stephen Lathrop]

Wait a minute, Armchair. We are only talking about law-abiding gun owners, right? Surely you don't mean to suggest that policy can't discern who among gun owners will be law-abiding henceforth. Or did you just wake up to understand that maybe gun policy shouldn't be premised on a law-abiding owner presumption, especially if you can't even live with that for your own brother?

[James Pollock]

" Or did you just wake up to understand that maybe gun policy shouldn’t be premised on a law-abiding owner presumption, especially if you can’t even live with that for your own brother?"

MY brother has more guns than I do. I went to a summer camp that had a rifle range when I was young, and went on to join a non-rifle-intensive branch of the military. That got me what turns out to be a lifetime supply of rifle practice.

Mom wouldn't let me have a BB gun, probably because she was afraid I'd shoot at my sister. But I wouldn't have, for at least the first week.

[NToJ]

Not generally. But Queen's proposal was strict liability only if private sellers fail to perform background checks. That's not something I would propose or necessarily agree with, but it's an attempt at a compromise position between gun control advocates and their opponents.

I don't know enough about the private sales loophole to feel strongly either way. But you seem to know a lot about gun regulation. What's your position on the private sales loophole to background checks? Or do you think there should be no background checks at all, even for federally licensed firearms deals? (Maybe you think there should not be licenses to sell firearms at all?)

As between a federally mandated background check for all sales, and giving private sellers the choice of that mandate or, alternatively, strict liability, which would you choose?

[Armchair Lawyer]

"But Queen’s proposal was strict liability only if private sellers fail to perform background checks"

That's inaccurate.

Queen's proposal also included all gifting, lending, borrowing and more. IE. "So, freedom to give your cousin or neighbor a gun, but responsibility for it too."

[NToJ]

I did not read the second half of Queen's comment carefully enough. Are you ok with Queen's proposal so long as it is limited to private sellers (as opposed to gifters)?

[James Pollock]

“So, freedom to give your cousin or neighbor a gun, but responsibility for it too.”

Freedom without responsibility is anarchy.

[Commenter_XY]

NtoJ....An interesting question. For private sales, they are that: private. Suppose a law-abiding Alaskan MMP participant wants a rifle for protection from critters (which BTW is actually something you need to do in AK - roads go for many miles with few passing drivers). Guess what? Can't buy a rifle from a licensed gun dealer, they'll get flagged on the background check. Any MMP participant is identified to the federal government.

In comes the private sale (or gift) to the rescue. That law-abiding Alaskan MMP participant can now obtain needed protection (rifle) in a private sale with, say a family member. No harm done.

[James Pollock]

"In comes the private sale (or gift) to the rescue. That law-abiding Alaskan MMP participant can now obtain needed protection (rifle) in a private sale with, say a family member."

If you're careful enough about defining "law-abiding" as not including any laws with which you disagree, you can turn everybody into a law-abiding hero.

[Dr. Ed 2]

It's not the background check that bothers me -- it's having to pay a registered gun dealer several hundred dollars (or more) to conduct it that bothers me.

Imagine if in order to give your old car to your daughter, you had to go pay the local Ford dealer $500-$1000 for permission to do so. In both cases, the cost of *giving* the gun or car to your child will exceed the value of the item.

BUT mandatory background checks on auto purchases would prevent unlicensed illegal aliens from buying cars...

[James Pollock]

"It’s not the background check that bothers me — it’s having to pay a registered gun dealer several hundred dollars (or more) to conduct it that bothers me."

That's the unregulated private market at work. Republicans never met a government task they wouldn't rather outsource to a private entity so that somebody could put a markup on it and keep the profit.

[swood1000]

OK, so if we can’t have background checks for private gun sales how about this: strict liability for private gun sellers but that’s vitiated if a background check was done.

Are you talking federal law? Remind me of the argument that this is interstate commerce when the buyer and seller both live in the same state.

[James Pollock]

Was the product being sold also made in the same state?

[Bob from Ohio]

"background checks for private gun sales"

What is this going to accomplish anyway except to harass regular citizens?

All these mass murderers pass the background check, doesn't stop them.

Carnage on the streets of Baltimore or Chicago comes from stolen guns.

[Armchair Lawyer]

Even when there are background checks and someone lies (Like Hunter Biden)....what's gonna happen?

https://thefederalist.com/2021/03/25/report-hunter-biden-may-have-lied-on-federal-background-check-form-to-purchase-a-gun/

[Absaroka]

Interesting essay by Glenn Loury.

[swood1000]

But those to whom Loury’s argument is directed have found that demonizing their opponents brings better results than answering such arguments logically. A black man making these arguments is simply called a self-hating Tom. Anybody else is called a racist, and those wishing to retain their woke credentials are quick to assert that Loury’s arguments have already been defeated logically so that anyone making them can only have base motivations.

Seriously, where is the principled logical argument answering Loury?

[Armchair Lawyer]

If you're going to introduce a concept of legal liability for lending an object, then logically it should be extended to all objects.

Not just the ones you don't really like.

[Queen Amalthea]

Some objects are inherently dangerous. We have different rules for kittens and tigers for a reason.

This is really silly. I'm quite sure you like guns *because* they are designed to be a weapon. There's nothing wrong with that btw! But pretending they are paperweights that also can be used as a weapon is just stupid.

[tkamenick]

You've said it twice now, are you really claiming that cars aren't inherently dangerous?

[James Pollock]

Where did you see someone claim that cars aren't dangerous?

[Armchair Lawyer]

tkamenick: "You’ve said it twice now, are you really claiming that cars aren’t inherently dangerous?"

James Pollock: "Where did you see someone claim that cars aren’t dangerous?"

Queen Amalthea: "Cars are not designed as a destructive thing in the same way that paperweights are not. Both can be used so, but it’s silly to think of them as inherently so."

[Queen Amalthea]

Where I explicitly said cars *can* be dangerous. The obtuseness here is stunning, but most motivated reasoning is.

[Armchair Lawyer]

But you also said saying cars were inherently dangerous would be "silly"

[Queen Amalthea]

It is silly, they can be dangerous but that's not the design or normal use. Guns and dynamite are designed to be dangerous, that's what they are for and what makes them useful.

[Armchair Lawyer]

You don't actually understand what the phrase "inherently dangerous" means.

https://www.merriam-webster.com/legal/inherently%20dangerous

[Queen Amalthea]

It is not the nature of a car to be dangerous, it is exactly the nature of a gun to be so. A gun is a weapon, to use it otherwise is silly (and to use a car as a weapon is in most situations silly as well). That we would have different liability rules for an object that's nature is to be dangerous than for objects that don't have such a nature just makes sense.

[Armchair Lawyer]

You have the definition literally in front of you, but you cannot read it for some reason...

[Stephen Lathrop]

I don't think I have ever seen a reference to a dictionary definition in these comments which was at all helpful. They always seem to get dragged in by someone who wants to blow up a context he is struggling to cope with. A dictionary reference is great for that, because it's always out of real context—even the OED is barely better.

[James Pollock]

"You don’t actually understand what the phrase “inherently dangerous” means. "

try looking for just "inherently". That seems to be where you're breaking down.
https://www.dictionary.com/browse/inherently

[Queen Amalthea]

Cars, unlike guns, are not designed to be weapons. Its silly to equate the two when they are two quite different things. There's a reason why if someone is threatening you you don't reach for your car keys.

[Armchair Lawyer]

Cars, unlike guns, are not designed to be weapons....

You've used "dynamite" several times as a comparison. "Dynamite" is not designed as a weapon. It's a construction explosive. It is not designed as a weapon. It is not a military explosive.

Would you say dynamite is not inherently dangerous, despite it not being DESIGNED as a weapon?

[De Oppresso Liber]

How do you not feel incredibly silly and embarrassed with this argument?

I'm embarrassed on your behalf. This is a conversation that would induce cringing in a college dorm, let alone a forum for people who like obscure political philosophies and law.

[Nige]

'Would you say dynamite is not inherently dangerous, despite it not being DESIGNED as a weapon?'

Who is this person you are talking to who thinks things not designed as weapons cannot be inherently dangerous?

[Queen Amalthea]

Dynamite is designed to be destructive as is a gun. It's what they both do. Again, guns are not paperweights, they are made to fire projectiles with destructive force, that's what they do and what they are *supposed* to do. Any other use for them is rather silly. Pretending that this is not true is plain silly.

[Armchair Lawyer]

You've changed your wording a few times here. First it was "inherently dangerous" but that was flawed. Then "an inherent weapon" but was flawed too.

Now "designed to be destructive" which is flawed as well. Unless you want to stop anyone from being able to lend someone a saw or a sledgehammer or an axe without "strict liability". That's going to be great in the construction trade....

[Queen Amalthea]

Saws and sledghammers are dangerous tools but not nearly as dangerous as a firearm so of course different rules could apply.

[Queen Amalthea]

And, btw, you know this. It's why, if you felt you were going somewhere threatening you would reach for your gun not your saw. You'd do so because you know your gun could hurt someones that want to hurt you much, much better than your saw would.

[Armchair Lawyer]

And there you go changing your wording, yet AGAIN, to some arbitrary, always shifting standard....

1. Inherently dangerous....but that changed.
2. Inherent weapon....but that changed
3. Designed to be destructive....but now THAT changed

[De Oppresso Liber]

You are being purposefully obstinate. Queen's point has been cogent and consistent throughout: guns are weapons as their primary purpose and design, which makes them inherently more dangerous than any of the embarrassing red herrings and false equivalencies you offer.

[James Pollock]

"There’s a reason why if someone is threatening you you don’t reach for your car keys."

Which is a shame,really, because if someone is threatening you being in a different place removes most of the danger.

[Gasman]

"If you’re going to introduce a concept of legal liability for lending an object, then logically it should be extended to all objects."

You posit that it is logical, yet offer no persuasive argument. Such a leap from defining a liability for one thing to all things is a wide chasm to cross. If there is any logic to such a demand, then do share.

[Armchair Lawyer]

If you're going to institute strict liability for "dangerous" commonly used objects, and want to be fair about it, it should be extended to all "dangerous" objects.

[Queen Amalthea]

The difference between you and I is that you think realizing that guns are inherently dangerous means paperweights are also inherently dangerous (because hey, I could hit you over the head with one) and so they are in the same category.

[Armchair Lawyer]

No, I used the phrase cars. Not paperweights. I never used the word paperweights.

You denied the fact that cars are inherently dangerous. Which is the problem.

[Queen Amalthea]

My point is that your argument comes down to 'well since a car can be dangerous and used as a weapon then any rule we have for dangerous weapons like guns would have to apply to them too.' But by that logic you might as well say paperweights, because they too can be dangerous and used as a weapon.

It's silly when supposed gun enthusiasts act like there's nothing special or different between firearms and other things. You know they are, in fact you're counting on it!

[Armchair Lawyer]

No, my point was I used STATISTICS and FACTS which demonstrated exactly how dangerous certain items are. Including cars.

[James Pollock]

No, you TRIED to use STATISTICS and FACTS, which is not the same thing.

[Don Nico]

AL,
We know from Alfred Hitchcock that a frozen leg of lamb is also inherently dangerous.

[Stephen Lathrop]

I once had occasion to threaten a flock of sheep with a frozen leg of lamb. I was on my way to visit friends in eastern Oregon. I brought the lamb along for dinner. Got stuck behind a flock of sheep all over the road. Naturally, they see a car coming, they all pack together and start down the road at a walk, ahead of the car.

So I got out of the car and waved the lamb leg around over my head. Didn't do any good at all. Even to sheep, a frozen lamb leg is not inherently dangerous.

[James Pollock]

"If you’re going to institute strict liability for “dangerous” commonly used objects, and want to be fair about it, it should be extended to all “dangerous” objects."

Just substitute "inherently dangerous" for "dangerous", and you have an argument somebody actually made.

[NToJ]

That sort of gets to the heart of the matter, doesn't it? If I loan my car to someone I know to be reckless, incompetent, or otherwise unfit to drive, I can (in some jurisdictions) be held liable, depending on the circumstances. Do you think that should be true of guns? (I assume it is, in many jurisdictions.)

Queen's proposal is that one way to mitigate the risk of guns being in the hands of reckless, incompetent, or otherwise unfit owners is to have the person doing the loaning (or selling) perform a background check. I don't think it's a good idea, but at least Queen is engaging a debate in a way that involves some compromise.

[Armchair Lawyer]

"That sort of gets to the heart of the matter, doesn’t it?"
--It does.
" I loan my car to someone I know to be reckless, incompetent, or otherwise unfit to drive, I can (in some jurisdictions) be held liable, depending on the circumstances. Do you think that should be true of guns? "
---You can, and I do.
"Queen’s proposal is that one way to mitigate the risk of guns being in the hands of reckless, incompetent, or otherwise unfit owners is to have the person doing the loaning (or selling) perform a background check. "
---Which is illogical and extreme. Which is why the car example was brought up. Imagine every time you wanted to lend your daughter your car, you needed to do a "background check". That background check could take up to 3 days. If you refuse to do it, you could be held personally liable for any actions. Want to lend a pickup truck to your neighbor? Better get on the horn to the FBI...

[NToJ]

I don't think people should be required to get background checks before handing their cars out, at all. But your objection seems easy to wire around. You just have a law that says you are strictly liable if you give your gun to someone only if you don't, within a reasonable time (duration of your choosing) secure the background check. If the other person commits a crime in that period, you're not strictly liable. If they commit it after you did the background check, but you failed to notify some authority of the sale and results of a failed background check, you may be liable after that.

Again, this isn't a good idea in my view, but let's engage the example and work through your objections.

[James Pollock]

"I don’t think people should be required to get background checks before handing their cars out"

Maybe check to see if they have a license before you hand over the keys.

[Armchair Lawyer]

Seem James, you don't get it. A license isn't a background check. If it was just a license, that would be one thing.

[James Pollock]

"Seem James, you don’t get it. A license isn’t a background check."

Mind pointing to where I said a license is a background check? I'll wait.

[James Pollock]

...still waiting.

[Armchair Lawyer]

Sure, let's walk through this. Let's take a set of brothers, Joe and Bob, hunting together, in upstate New York, but with different rifles. They want to try out each other's rifles.

Can they "trade rifles"? Well, according to you, no. They need to do a background check on each other first. Well, how do they do that? Well, they need to go to a licensed firearm dealer. So, they then need to drive 3 hours, each way, to the nearest firearms dealer, pay the fee (which is at least $10, each, but can be more according to some New York law, up to $80 each), and after all of that, they can try each other's rifles for a shot or two.

Does that seem logical?

[Armchair Lawyer]

But wait....it gets better.

See, the FBI has up to 3 business days to do the background check. So, Bob and Joe can go drive down to the store. But then they need to wait for 3 business days. Then they can drive back, and try each other's guns. But then they need to drive BACK to the store to do the background check AGAIN to transfer the guns back to each other. So that's ANOTHER 3 business days. Now we're looking at more than 8 days.

But wait, it gets even better. Many times people want to try out a gun before purchasing it. However, under your law, that would be effectively impossible. Because the same transfer laws would apply. "I'd like to try the gun"...."Please sign here, wait 3 days." OK..."Then you need to hold onto the gun for ANOTHER 3 days before you can hand it back".

[NToJ]

In the real world, they would just trade rifles, like normal people. Even Queen’s suggestion (which I’ve told you 3 times I disagree with) would result in them trading rifles. Why are you pretending to be dumb?

[James Pollock]

After 9 11, we (collectively) decided that trying to get aboard an airliner was a potentially hostile act, and started checking would-be passengers for weapons that might be used to seize control of an airliner in flight. You want to go to the part of the airport where people wait to get on airliners? You get a search, then. Probable cause? warrant? Heck no, just trying to get to Concourse C is all the justification we need to give you a pat-down. Even if you don't actually try to get on a plane, in fact, especially if you don't actually try to get on a plane, you get the security scan. And that's to keep you from getting your hands on an airliner. But a background check before you can have a firearm is flatly unacceptable.

[Absaroka]

" Want to lend a pickup truck to your neighbor? Better get on the horn to the FBI…"

What I think the Lieutenant meant to say was 'Head down to the car dealer, pay $50, wait N days, then when your neighbor is back from the lumberyard with his plywood, go back to the car dealer, pay $50, and wait N days to get your truck back'.

This is a classic example of what's wrong with the gun debate. If you think background checks are awesome, make them easy and free, e.g.:

-if you're selling/loaning/whatever a gun to Fred, you call up/visit a web page and put in Fred's name and driver's license number (and nothing else). You get an immediate answer whether Fred can posses a gun.
-put a G got Guns endorsement on driver's licenses, and say you have to see Fred's endorsement before loaning him the gun.

As a sweetener, put this system into a bill that includes national reciprocity and removes the restrictions on interstate gun transfers, so you can give your out of state sibling a gun as long as you see their endorsement.

That bill would pass easily.

[Absaroka]

'G for', not G got'...

[James Pollock]

Carry permit. Got one? Then you can carry your gun (or someone else's). Don't got one? Stop. Don't touch. Tell an adult.

[Artifex]

Can rational thinking actually be taught or is the capability innate ? If it can be taught, can it be taught to older students and why is this not a priority of our educational system ?

[Queen Amalthea]

By rational thinking Artifex surely means 'thinking and coming to the conclusions I do.'

[Artifex]

As if on queue ...

No, I am less interested in conclusions than I am methodologies. Most of the more interesting conversations I have are with folks that have reached different conclusions but still attempt rational discourse. As an example, I hold Scott Alexander in the highest esteem but politically we would agree on little.

You provide a perfect example. You take a premise, distort to a strawman that you can then burn down and dance around gleefully stroking your own ego. From an intellectual view this is worthless. Jason Brennan over at the old Bleeding Heart Libertarians site would call you a "Hooligan". Can someone like you be taught rational discourse or is it a lost cause ? If someone had trained you at young enough age would you be salvageable ?

[Queen Amalthea]

Brennan is a goofball, someone who makes near autistic thinking a goal. Don't make his mistakes.

[Queen Amalthea]

Look at someone who tried to reify 'rationality' like Max Weber. His 'purposely rational' systems are basically strange autistic eccentricities, not desirable in the least.

Read more Hume and less Brennan. It won't make you feel very superior, but it'll be more accurate.

[NToJ]

Could you give a specific example of a Brennan proposal that leads to "autistic thinking" or "autistic eccentricities"? What is it you mean when you say "autistic"?

[NToJ]

By goofball do you mean ‘thinking and coming to the conclusions I don't’?

[Queen Amalthea]

Brennan and yourself are good examples of what I'm talking about. If someone dares disagree with Brennan on, say, adjunct pay or the rationality of voting, he would fire off post after post attacking (sometimes in a puerile way) that person. Not very Vulcan (Spock would care less if someone said he was wrong)! And your immediate response was to insult me personally (not whining, I rather asked for it).

People that deify 'rationality' are usually looking for a way to say 'my thinking is superior.'

[De Oppresso Liber]

I dunno about this Brennan guy, but it seems the general public and the GOP voter especially could use a good dose of rational thinking.

I find that many GOP, 'Q', and anti vaxx lines of thought and arguments break down rather quickly when you have them map out each component of the argument rationally. A leads to B leads to C, no anonymous "they" or "them"s doing things for unspecified motivations through unspecified means. No assumptions about motivation or secret objectives, etc.

[Don Nico]

DeOL,
You could have addes anti-GMO to your list of anti-vaxx etc., but that would include a different political persuasion.
Actually, I find just as unreasonable the assertion that those under 16 are or will be insignificant as vectors of coronavirus diseases.
Science is not for just the times when it might agree with one's politics.

[De Oppresso Liber]

I agree. Anti GMO arises from the same lack of logical procession in thought.

[Stephen Lathrop]

De Oppresso Liber — Or it arises from more-broadly informed insight into what might be wrong with GMO technology.

I suspect that concerns about health effects from GMO foods are a red herring. I don't hesitate to eat GMO food because I think it will poison me.

I have no doubt at all that GMO technology as it is currently used, and intended to be used, is at least an ecological detriment, likely trending toward an ecological disaster more threatening by far than DDT ever was.

I won't go into all the arguments. I will mention one point used to support GMO crop use, and suggest what is wrong with it. The argument is made that GMO is better, because it permits reduced use of pesticides on food crops. Maybe there is something to that, from the point of view of concern about poison in your food.

Ecologically, it is worse than wrong. The ecological objection to herbicides and pesticides is not that they are nasty chemicals. It is that they kill indiscriminately, and they kill too much.

Why do farmers want GMO instead of old-fashioned chemicals? Because GMO kills even more indiscriminately, kills even more than any pesticide, and does it more cheaply. That is the advantage which sells GMO to farmers. That is what modern industrial farming prefers. Get rid of everything which even slightly reduces yield. That takes anti-ecology about as far as it can go.

Until GMO crops came into widespread use, I never saw farm fields that looked actually sterile—except for the crops. There was always some irrelevant-to-farmers life around. Bugs. A few weeds. Reptiles. Birds. Small mammals. Not anymore.

With GMO farming methods, it's just crops. Whatever may have been intended, in practical use GMO methods attack ecosystems at the lowest levels of food supply and habitat availability. The damage spreads upward. It has not been a subtle change. You don't need a study to see it—just some experience with how things used to look—or still do look where GMO technology is not in use.

For years now I have visited a wildlife refuge in Delaware, every summer. To get there, you have to drive for a few miles through farm fields. Previously, if I saw an interesting looking bird along the road, I stopped among the fields to take a look. I also got used to the look of the cropland (it has long been industrial-type agriculture there, so not a lot of variety), and noticed other critters including snakes, box turtles, woodchucks, mice and voles. I needed bug repellent to get out of the car.

Post GMO, all you see is clean ground between the crop rows, almost no birds (no insect-eating species at all), nothing else on the ground, and no need for bug repellent. The starkly perfect cornfields run right to the boundary of the wildlife refuge. The contrast at the border is staggering.

Whatever you may think about GMO technology, it isn't the perfect miracle its boosters would have you believe. Continued use of it is storing up a lot of ecological trouble, apparently almost unnoticed. You shouldn't be pointing to opposition to GMO technology as an example of unreason.

[De Oppresso Liber]

Thanks for bringing that up. Yes, I am also concerned about GMO's potential fall out on the eco system. I was assuming Don Nico was speaking of people who won't eat GMO, or the knee jerk anti GMO activism that results in things like destroying yellow rice crops that prevent vitamin deficiencies in the developing world.

[Nige]

Ignoring good reasons to be worried about something like GMO is also a form of unreason.

[Artifex]

And your immediate response was to insult me personally

I simply note that your are incapable or unwilling of actually addressing points made. When actual thought would motivate you to run counter to the preferred narrative, you find something else to talk about. While I might use anti-rational as a pejorative, it is also a bit funny that the creature defending anti-rationality also takes it as an insult when when their mode of thought is pointed out.

While "deifies rationality" assumes facts not in evidence in pursuit of a narrative, I will note that reason is a pretty good tool for modeling the objective world if you want accurate predictions and to make accurate guesses as to what might happen. It might just be me, but I find that rational reflection tends to produce better results than your emotive hysteria.

[Queen Amalthea]

You're proving my point, and it's really funny that the Defender of Rationality can't see that. I mean, what rational principle lies behind your talking of my 'emotive hysteria?' Your response is run through with emotion, but again that's my point, nearly everyone who talks so highly about 'people being rational' does just that. It's just something some people do to make them feel like their thinking and conclusions is superior (which is, ironically, not rational either).

[apedad]

Rational thought is innate.

It's irrational thinking that's taught.

[Queen Amalthea]

I don't think so. We evolved to better catch rabbits and such, we did not evolve to be 'rational.' Robots and Vulcans maybe, but not us.

[Artifex]

Hmmm, my experience with infants does not lead me to believe they are the height of rationality. One isn't born with the capability to figure out that given the rules of the integers the square root of two is irrational. At least some of rationality is taught

[James Pollock]

"Hmmm, my experience with infants does not lead me to believe they are the height of rationality."

Mine does. They start with simple stimuli ("I want something") and develop a cause/effect relationship ("If i wail long enough and loud enough, someone will bring me what I want") Eventually, they learn language and increase the likelihood of getting what they want brought to them.

[Nige]

The rational cannot exist, or function, without the emotional or the imaginative.

[Queen Amalthea]

Reason is, and ought only to be the slave of the passions, and can never pretend to any other office than to serve and obey them.
David Hume

[Brett Bellmore]

That's true: A perfectly rational and nothing more being would just sit there inert, like a pocket calculator, with no motivation. It might understand that failing to eat would result in starvation, but it wouldn't care about it.

[NToJ]

The rational can exist and function without emotional or imagination. It may not function in a way that you or Brett or Queen thinks is useful. But your concept of useful is driven by passions, not reason.

Hume did not think rationality is impossible without emotional or the imaginitive. He just thought it would be useless in the same way you describe.

You can get out of this philosophical quagmire by just reading two more paragraphs of Hume. Maybe it's difficult for biological machines like humans to imagine a hungerless but rational being doing anything. But humans can have irrational passions, as Hume thoughtfully pointed out. And that's the argument for appeals to reason.

[Don Nico]

Nige,
That proposition is patently false.
The application of logic does not and never has depended on emotional maturity

[Nige]

Sure, if you treat logic like the physicist in the old joke 'take a perfectly spherical horse.'

[Ben_]

The "education system" is about other people’s money and about politics, not about teaching anyone anything.

[Artifex]

While that may be true to a certain extent, and it is difficult to see the teachers unions as anything other than a detriment to education, it does not seem like there is a focus in teaching critical thinking in private schools either. So my guess is that it is something other than institutional self interest.

[James Pollock]

The problem with teaching critical thinking is that it is most likely to be used in the immediate vicinity of where it was taught. Some people react quite strongly to having their core beliefs subjected to critical thinking. These people are called "Conservatives".

[Don Nico]

James,
Sentence 1 was a good start.
Then you degenerated into name calling.

[James Pollock]

As I went on to say "Some people react quite strongly to having their core beliefs subjected to critical thinking."

As you demonstrated.

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

Disaffected, defeated, education-disdaining, grievance-consumed, hopeless conservatives are among my favorite culture war casualties.

[Absaroka]

"Can rational thinking actually be taught"

To some degree, surely. My wife was a HS teacher. When kids were coming in and she was taking roll she would always have some subject matter relevant news article up on the overhead/display. Occasionally she would include a ringer from The Onion or one of the National Enquirer type papers.

She would give a couple of point extra credit question on the tests drawn from the current event articles, so kids would pay attention. They would be dutifully copying down something about Man-Lizard hybrids discovered living in caves or something. She would ask how that comported with what they had been learning about the genetics of reproduction ... slowly the light would dawn. They got a lot better at assessing the articles over time, to the point of finding weaknesses in the actual articles.

[Brett Bellmore]

You can teach the techniques of rationality, but rationality itself, as distinct from rationalizing, is more of a moral virtue than technique. It requires the discipline to follow a line of thought even when you don't like where it's going, and not let your own preferences guide you.

Unfortunately, intelligence is not a great help here, as it is as useful for rationalizing as it is for rationality. It's an engine, not a hand on the steering wheel.

[Artifex]

This sort of gets to the basis for my question. I can try as hard as I might with a child to teach ethics, responsibility and the things I would see as making a worthwhile adult and still sometimes fail. I suspect rationality is of the same character.

Now that you bring it up, it is also interesting we no longer try to teach moral virtue either.

[James Pollock]

"I can try as hard as I might with a child to teach ethics, responsibility and the things I would see as making a worthwhile adult and still sometimes fail."

You can teach ethics and responsibility with no significant effort, because a child will pick up what you model for them. so if you lecture them that smoking is bad for them but go through a couple of packs a day, what you are teaching and what you intended to teach are not the same.

[Nige]

'we no longer try to teach moral virtue either.'

Good luck instilling good old conservative Christian family values in the kids after electing Donald Trump.

[James Pollock]

"ya see that? Don't do that!" done.

[Jimmy the Dane]

Media: Using examples of illegal immigrants breaking the law, committing crimes, or engaging in other similar behavior is not representative of the migrant experience. It is not a legitimate tactic to use these stories to try to influence public policy.

Media: Look at all these dead people!!!! Blood is running in the streets!!!! We need gun control now!!!!

[Nige]

Well, you do need gun control now.

[Life of Brian]

you do need gun control

I've had the sense for some time now that you're basically another Martined -- lobbing in swaths of largely thought-free bloviating from outside the US instructing us how to run our country. Thanks for confirming you have no skin in the game.

[Nige]

I was talking to Jimmy, Brian.

[James Pollock]

Do you really not see the fundamental difference between the two prongs you're presenting?

In the first one, the problem is generalizing from isolated individual to larger groups.

The solution to both is the same: Learn to identify the people who are actually causing the problem, and target them specifically for corrective action.

If you think the first one is actually A-OK for deciding policy (some illegal immigrants do bad things, therefore all immigration should be blocked.) then you're probably also OK with "some prominent Conservatives are racist assholes, therefore all Conservatives are racist assholes."

[Jimmy the Dane]

"Do you really not see the fundamental difference between the two prongs you’re presenting?"

I think you should take a moment and answer your own question.

The problem is the media uses #2 to try to convince the public that America has a "gun problem", is awash with gun violence, and that simply passing gun control laws is the fix, when that just is not remotely true.

And with #1, the media uses this as justification to effectively black out any stories of illegal immigrant criminal activity.

So perhaps you should answer your own question before posing it in the future.

[Ben_]

Because the media/leftists are bigoted against gun owners and are looking for a way to arrest and imprison innocent people who are not like them. They don't care that the gun owners they would arrest are innocent and have hurt no one. Gun owners are the other.

It’s exactly what Klan members would advocate if you replace gun owners with black folks. Same sentiment. Same willingness to mistreat innocents and the law-abiding. Same ignorance and unwillingness to learn. Same dramatization and prejudice.

[Queen Amalthea]

The least self aware person in the world strikes again.

[Ben_]

^ the least able to formulate an on-topic response strikes again.

[James Pollock]

"the least able to formulate an on-topic response strikes again."

Swell. What do you have to say?

[Ben_]

About comments about me? I have exactly nothing to say on that topic. No one cares.

[James Pollock]

Indeed.

[Queen Amalthea]

Ben genuinely doesn't see that he's doing exactly what he's criticizing in the very act of criticizing. Wow.

'I hate all stupid leftists because they are always insultingly generalizing about people like me!'

Lol.

[James Pollock]

"Because the media/leftists are bigoted against gun owners and are looking for a way to arrest and imprison innocent people who are not like them. They don’t care that the gun owners they would arrest are innocent and have hurt no one. Gun owners are the other."

I'm not a media/leftist, but I confess that I do divide gun owners into two categories: Responsible and irresponsible. I have not advocated anything against the former. People that are responsible with their weapon(s) do not create any problems for anybody else. Alas, this category does not encompass everybody who possesses a firearm.

[Ben_]

"People that are responsible with their weapon(s) do not create any problems for anybody else."

Leftists and news media want these people who "do not create any problems for anybody else" arrested and imprisoned.

[James Pollock]

"Leftists and news media want these people who “do not create any problems for anybody else” arrested and imprisoned."

Sure they do. That's why leftists and news media have such a long and proud history of suppressing the prison-industrial complex.

[De Oppresso Liber]

The US is, actually and factually, awash in gun violence as compared to any non-warzone, non-3rd world country. It's embarrassing, expensive, and also one of the root causes of police and state violence in this country.

Support the 2nd amendment because you support the rule of law and the constitution, but don't try these bullshit arguments that guns are not causing a lot of damage. Whatever happened to simply being principled?

[Aubrey LaVentana]

"also one of the root causes of police and state violence in this country. "

Nope. War on Drugs.

A War on Guns will look very much like the War on Drugs, already does. Prices go up, signaling producers to ramp up, widespread availability on black market. Rich and poor easily access them. Enforcers become corrupted. Laws expand to suppress precursors.

[De Oppresso Liber]

Britain and many other western countries have their own war on drugs. None of them are even close in regards to gun violence. The guns are a required element for widespread gun violence. This is exactly the type of weasel, bullshit, ridiculous-on-their-face arguments I'm talking about.

Just embrace liberty for the sake of liberty, and quit trying to gin up some bullshit tortured reasoning about how guns aren't actually any more dangerous than a Prius.

Otherwise I might start responding with dumb-shit, tortured logic arguments of my own, like, why don't we arm our marines with Priuses then?

[James Pollock]

Perhaps Aubrey meant to bring up Mexico, which does have a broad limitation on private ownership of firearms and has done so since the Revolution in 1920. They're unable to effectively enforce the laws because the US is right next door, and so smuggling keeps the criminals armed and dangerous. coincidentally, the same smugglers who run drugs north run guns south, sometimes with the help of US government and sometimes with the help of capitalists eager to exploit an underserved market..

[De Oppresso Liber]

We already discussed and dismissed 3rd world countries as relevant examples. And besides, is this supposed to be supportive of current gun laws? The fact that Mexico is also awash in guns from our easy to get guns? Mmmk.

[Nige]

Flooding thrid world countries with guns to either turn them into war-torn hellholes or keep them that way, profitably and/or strategically, is all part of the gun-game. (Not just the US, obvsly.)

[Brett Bellmore]

" They’re unable to effectively enforce the laws because the US is right next door, and so smuggling keeps the criminals armed and dangerous. "

That's a fiction Obama advanced, and had the BATF running a program of enabling gun smuggling to create evidence for. A program they had to end when too many of the guns they arranged to be smuggled ended up at crime scenes.

In reality, the criminals in Mexico are typically supplied by a black market fed by Mexican Army supplies, the Army is corrupt and sells them to black marketeers.

[Queen Amalthea]

Brett sees conspiracy, sun comes up in the east.

[Ben_]

^ ad hominems and gibberish

[Queen Amalthea]

Ben is the kind of guy who thinks the story of Chicken Little is an ad hominem.

[James Pollock]

"' the US is right next door, and so smuggling keeps the criminals armed and dangerous. '
That’s a fiction Obama advanced"

Obama advanced a fiction that Mexico shares a border with the USA, or that US-made weapons keep finding their way into Mexico?

Oh, wait, you went on to concede that the sting operation to trace the guns from the US to Mexico had to be stopped because of where those guns were ending up, so you have at least a glimmer of awareness.

[Aubrey LaVentana]

"Armed crime, never a problem in England, has now become one. Handguns are banned but the Kingdom has millions of illegal firearms. Criminals have no trouble finding them and exhibit a new willingness to use them. In the decade after 1957, the use of guns in serious crime increased a hundredfold."

"In the 1960s and early 1970s, the gun‐less Soviet Union’s murder rates paralleled or generally exceeded those of gun‐ridden America. While American rates stabilized and then steeply declined, however, Russian murder increased so drastically that by the early 1990s the Russian rate was three times higher than that of the United States."

https://web.archive.org/web/20180307061943/http://www.law.harvard.edu/students/orgs/jlpp/Vol30_No2_KatesMauseronline.pdf

and I've only rented a Prius. Once.

[Aubrey LaVentana]

" . . criminal violence rampantly increased so that by 2000 England surpassed the United States to become one of the developed world’s most violence‐ridden nations."

Same paper I already cited.

[Jimmy the Dane]

Yeah this is simply not true or is at least disingenuous. The US has overall lower violent crime then a lot of the civilized world. Yes more violent crime involves a firearm here, but the overall incidents of violent crime are much lower. Just in other countries you get stabbed 45 times and beat with a baseball bat until your eyes pop out instead of shot and those countries are overall more dangerous for your average citizen because they lack the means to defend themselves.

[James Pollock]

" in other countries you get stabbed 45 times and beat with a baseball bat until your eyes pop out instead of shot and those countries are overall more dangerous for your average citizen because they lack the means to defend themselves."

Take your Louisville Slugger with you when you visit. Or take an aluminum bat, you aren't limited by MLB rules.

[VinniUSMC]

"Take your Louisville Slugger with you when you visit. Or take an aluminum bat, you aren’t limited by MLB rules."

Except that, in places like this (the UK for example), you also can't carry a bat "for self defense".

[James Pollock]

Ok, get a cricket bat instead.

[James Pollock]

"I think you should take a moment and answer your own question."

I did, in the sentence immediately following the text you quoted.

Perhaps reading is not your strong suit?

[Queen Amalthea]

I guess Jimmy doesn't get that this can be turned around...

[Ben_]

You know who doesn’t undergo a background check? Illegal immigrants.

Why are you advocating background checks for innocents who obey laws and defending people who illegally sneak across borders?

The most obvious answer is that you harbor prejudice against gun owners.

It can’t be related to danger because innocent gun owners who have hurt no one are, by definition, not dangerous.

[De Oppresso Liber]

https://www.theonion.com/no-way-to-prevent-this-says-only-nation-where-this-r-1819576527

When you start sounding exactly like parody, maybe it's time to check yourself.

[James Pollock]

"You know who doesn’t undergo a background check? Illegal immigrants.

Why are you advocating background checks for innocents who obey laws and defending people who illegally sneak across borders?"

The funny thing is that a substantial number of illegal immigrants were 100% legal when they crossed the border, and became illegal when they didn't cross back.

The point is to apply background checks to guiltys, not innocents. Innocents don't object to background checks, because they're innocent.

[Queen Amalthea]

"It can’t be related to danger because innocent gun owners who have hurt no one are, by definition, not dangerous."

It's stupid to have speed limits because by definition speeders are not going to follow them!

Ben's on quite the roll today.

[Ben_]

Try to stay on topic. Discussions work better when you:
- have a point
- can relate one thought to another in regards to the topic of discussion
- have something to offer besides ad hominems and gibberish.

Try it out sometime.

[Queen Amalthea]

Ben, that you don't get the point doesn't mean there isn't one there. It means you're not very bright.

[James Pollock]

"Try to stay on topic"

Sure. Will you be giving it a try, as well?

[James Pollock]

"The most obvious answer is that you harbor prejudice against gun owners. "

I harbor significant prejudice against irresponsible gun owners, and don't remember ever claiming otherwise.

[jb]

You're making fun of the media's hypocrisy, yet perfectly happy to engage in the exact same hypocrisy in the other direction.

And yet...

The issue with immigrants is that they don't commit crimes at a higher rate than non-immigrants, yet the evidence is quite clear that the US has a lot more gun crime (and mass shootings in particular) than places with more controls on guns. So in fact random tales of immigrant crime are not representative of a reasonable criticism of immigrants, whereas anecdotes of gun violence are examples of how the US is different from most other countries.

[Queen Amalthea]

"You’re making fun of the media’s hypocrisy, yet perfectly happy to engage in the exact same hypocrisy in the other direction."

I see you've met Ben.

[Ben_]

"The issue with immigrants is that they don’t commit crimes at a higher rate than non-immigrants, yet the evidence is quite clear that the US has a lot more gun crime (and mass shootings in particular) than places with more controls on guns. So in fact random tales of immigrant crime are not representative of a reasonable criticism of immigrants, whereas anecdotes of gun violence are examples of how the US is different from most other countries."

Is this an endorsement of prejudice against groups of people as long as some group characteristic is correlated with a higher incidence of crime or something else bad?

Why don't we just avoid that sort of guilt-by-association and treat people as individuals? Innocents shot no one.

[Queen Amalthea]

Again, Ben is the kind of fellow who thinks stop lights are dumb because by definition those who run stop lights won't stop at them.

[Ben_]

You seem to be endorsing guilt-by-association and prejudice against innocents based on some shared characteristic.

But it might just be your usual gibberish and inability to express a rational argument.

[Queen Amalthea]

Ben, we get you don't get my point, but when you clearly don't invoking the virtues of rational argument makes it just look worse.

[James Pollock]

"But it might just be your usual gibberish and inability to express a rational argument."

These are things Ben has a proprietary interest in, so stop infringing his trademark.

[James Pollock]

"Why don’t we just avoid that sort of guilt-by-association and treat people as individuals? Innocents shot no one."

Who told you they did?

[Jimmy the Dane]

The numbers you cite are not accurate, first.

Second, the issue with illegals breaking the law is it shouldn't happen in the first place. They shouldn't be in the country so the crime they commit shouldn't be happening. That is the main problem with illegals and crime. It is completely avoidable if we just had sufficient border controls.

[Sarcastr0]

Guns are machines; they are all the same and may be judged collectively.

People are not machines, and should not be judged collectively.

Jimmy is hoping you cannot tell the difference, and may be judged accordingly on an individual basis.

[Jimmy the Dane]

That is some good gaslighting there Sarc, as usual.

Machines require operators.....who are those operators? Most crimes involve tools, which require operators...who are those operators?

[Sarcastr0]

Gun laws are about guns. Not people that have guns.

We regulate fertilizer as well, and not because we hate farmers.

[Jimmy the Dane]

So do we run those background checks on the gun before it is purchased...?

This is pretty lame argumentation even for you.

[James Pollock]

No, you run the background check on the non-gun-owner who wants to possess a firearm.

[Sarcastr0]

Do you think the stories about blood in the streets is unfair to mass shooters, because if you want to make the issue about gun wielders, that's what you're arguing now.

[Jimmy the Dane]

My argument is lots of bad things happen all over the world and not all things can be "fixed" when it comes to the human condition. And maybe, just maybe, what we should recognize is that whipping people in a frenzy and them giving them a false "solution" that infringes upon a core concept of ordered liberty isn't what we ought to be doing as a society.

[James Pollock]

"My argument is lots of bad things happen all over the world and not all things can be “fixed” when it comes to the human condition."

This is particularly true if your preferred solution to try solving problems is to do nothing.

[Dr. Ed 2]

I don't think the left understands just how much they are pissing off the country right now, or just how mad Joe Sixpack is.

Let alone how mad he will become when the stock market tanks and his retirement has evaporated.

[Moderation4ever]

I don't think Joe Sixpack's problem is the left. Joe problem is that the world is changing around him faster than he would like it too. Joe anxious and some people are taking advantage. They having him whipped up about undocumented immigrants, minimum wages, and Green New Deal. While he busy at that, the people whipping him up are automating or shuttering the plant he works.

[Ben_]

What are you going to do about it? Vote? Hahahaha!

[De Oppresso Liber]

Yeah, the whole Big Lie was an incredibly short sighted strategy.

But of course, they were supposed to seize that election and make sure it was the last real election.

Too bad they relied on the impeccable planning and foresight of ...Donald Trump? Yeesh.

[Sarcastr0]

Imaginary people can't vote, Ben.

[Ben_]

Tell them that.

[Sarcastr0]

Can't find them.

They're all in Ed's head, and I'm not going in there!

[James Pollock]

Why not? It's just a big empty space.

[De Oppresso Liber]

Ed, you and your fellow cultist fail to realize, over and over, that you are a loud and obnoxious minority. The clear global and US majority hated Trump. Hated him. And they hate his treasonous cult.

And Joe Biden has continued to enjoy approval ratings far above the highest Trump ever achieved in his whole presidency.

You cultists are unpopular, bereft of leadership or even guiding principles, and morally bankrupt.

[James Pollock]

"I don’t think the left understands just how much they are pissing off the country right now, or just how mad Joe Sixpack is."

If Joe Sixpack is so pissed off, maybe it's because he drinks too much.

"Let alone how mad he will become when the stock market tanks"

Like the way it dived when Trump was confirmed to be on the way out?

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

If we are fortunate, the stock market under Pres. Biden will look more like the markets on the Clinton and Obama watches and less like the markets during Republican administrations.

[NonLawyerDan]

Just looking for specifics: Why do you think J6 is so mad right now?

[James Pollock]

He's mad because wishing for something doesn't make it come true, no matter how strongly you want it, assuming Ed Sixpack is a typical member of the class. When he speaks, that's who he speaks for.

[NonLawyerDan]

Well, what does Ed think are the things the left is doing that is pissing off the country? Are we talking Cancel Culture? Gun talk? He must have specifics in mind.

[James Pollock]

Just breathing is enough.

[rsteinmetz]

I have a legal question.

It appears that the Atlanta Massage Parlor shooter was previously committed to a mental institution.

Depending on the details of that he could have been ineligible to purchase a gun. Yet he was able to. As far as I know he has not been charged with a firearms violation.

There is speculation his lawyers may be setting up an insanity defense. Could he also plead guilty to any firearms charge by reason of insanity?

[Jimmy the Dane]

"Mental Illness" will not always prohibit firearms possession under state and local laws. It is a more complex question then simply "he was treated for a mental illness, so he should not have had a gun..."

Reporting actual qualifying mental health records is also a complex issue. It requires a myriad of state databases to line up with the federal NICS system and that it not the easiest thing to do. Also states have different qualifying criteria so the reporting is inconsistent.

[James Pollock]

Plus you get some people operating the system who are ideologically opposed to having it work properly. Coincidentally, for them it doesn't.

[Don Nico]

"previously committed to a mental institution"
Please clarify what that means. Was he in the hospital for a time (if so on a 5150) or was he in a long term conservatorship in a long-tern mental care facility?

[rsteinmetz]

I don't know the details just reading to news reports. I do know that depending on the circumstance it may or may not disqualify someone form purchasing a gun.

[rsteinmetz]

Some reports say he was in residential rehab for a sex addiction and then in a transition facility. He has been reported to have said he relapsed and went to massage parlors for sex acts. None of the massage parlors have been identified as offering sex services nor have any of the victims be identified as sex workers.

[Don Nico]

That does not sound like a disqualifying mental condition. I am afraid that in this case the press report is just more dumping on people with mental illness.

[Life of Brian]

None of the massage parlors have been identified as offering sex services nor have any of the victims be identified as sex workers.

What, they didn't have signs up in the window and/or profiles posted on the interwebs? Or the survivors just assured the investigators no way no how was any hanky panky going on?

[rsteinmetz]

I don't think anybody looked. But I could be wrong. If they had it might have undermined the story of a racial motivation.

[Brett Bellmore]

Maybe he shot the place up because they didn't offer that service?

[James Pollock]

I thought the police reported that the reason he started shooting was that the poor fellow just had a really bad day.

[VinniUSMC]

"I thought the police reported that the reason he started shooting was that the poor fellow just had a really bad day."

As usual, you thought wrong.

https://reason.com/2021/03/19/aaron-robert-long-spa-killer-atlanta-jay-baker-cop-bad-day/

[James Pollock]

As usual, you can't read.
https://reason.com/2021/03/19/aaron-robert-long-spa-killer-atlanta-jay-baker-cop-bad-day/

[AtR]

There have been a number of legal arguments back and forth about mandatory vaccination ... here is one based on ethical/historical arguments:

https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/covid-vaccines-must-voluntary-ari-trachtenberg/

[Life of Brian]

Thanks -- that's one of the more thoughtful and balanced articles I've read in a while. I'm elevating this part of it for the youngsters around here who can't wrap their heads around how "SCIENCE!!!1" as a whole sometimes gets it wrong in a big way for a long time -- particularly in a circumstance where the pharma companies take the lead on testing their own products:

The list of public medical failures is quite long, including:

(1860’s) medicinal Cocaine – used for years before its addictiveness was realized;
(1900’s) X-rays - used for years before the relationship to cancer was realized;
(1930's) DES - prescribed against miscarriages until 1971, but caused rare cancers for mother and child;
(1940’s) oxygen for premature infants – blinded about 10,000 infants over 12 years;
(1950’s) Cutter incident – a vaccine that gave polio to thousands of recipients, resulting, in more than a hundred paralyzed and several dead;
(1960’s) Thalidomide – widely used as a “safe” sedative, but led to severe birth defects;
(1970’s) Swine flu – a fast-tracked vaccine caused sickness with little benefit;
(1980’s) Blood transfusions – hemophiliacs were given high-risk HIV-tainted blood;
(2010’s) Dengvaxia – a vaccine for dengue fever may have increased risk of sickness.

Off the top of my head I'd add the Japanese SMON "epidemic" that turned out to have been caused by clioquinol, the drug that was mass-prescribed as the supposed cure for it.

[Brett Bellmore]

"(1960’s) Thalidomide – widely used as a “safe” sedative, but led to severe birth defects;"

Technically, it IS a safe sedative, so long as you're not going to get pregnant.

[Ridgeway]

It was also prescribed for morning sickness, which, in retrospect, seems to have been a mistake.

[James Pollock]

It wasn't prescribed at all in the US.

[Queen Amalthea]

Science experts certainly have and will get things wrong, but you know who gets things far, far, far, far, far more wrong? Amateur yahoos. But hey, bet the way you like.

[AtR]

@Queen - do you have evidence for this, or is it just an urban legend?

[Queen Amalthea]

It's inductive logic 101: people with education, training and accomplishment in a field vs. amateur yahoos, who is more likely to be right more?

[Don Nico]

AtR,
Do you actually think that the frequency of "getting things wrong" is independent of the level of actual, in depth knowledge of the topic?

[James Pollock]

"do you have evidence for this, or is it just an urban legend?"

science works. We know that because the scientific method has built-in error detection. It takes time, but it tends to weed out the mistakes. Sometimes what has to happen is that a very prominent scientist with wrong ideas has to die off, and let the younger scientists who aren't wedded to the wrong idea work it out.

One example that directly supports QA's claim: In 1969, the NYT belatedly apologized to Robert Goddard for telling him that he didn't understand science because he thought rockets could and would in outer space. Turns out that they can, and scientists know why even if journalists didn't.

[James Pollock]

Refer to "The Relativity of Wrong" by Isaac Asimov.

[James Pollock]

"do you have evidence for this, or is it just an urban legend?"

Historically, people with access to more information are better at making decisions.

[Life of Brian]

A lovely worldview that is yours to have. But the thread was about forced vaccinations of the entire population with a substance that (at the very least as to the mRNA-based products) any intellectually honest person -- scientist and "amateur yahoo" alike -- must regard as a highly experimental treatment with unknown long-term effects.

The level of certainty required to justify that sort of (in one of the rare correct uses of the term) unprecedented degree of invasion into bodily autonomy and personal choice should be much, much higher than "shut up -- we've got this."

[Sarcastr0]

You're right - the decisions on vaccinations should not be made by scientists or by amateurs, but by our elected policymakers, within our policymaking system.

[Life of Brian]

the decisions on vaccinations should not be made by scientists or by amateurs, but by our elected policymakers

Ah, so the words "shut up -- we've got this" should be uttered by a group of people who don't even purport to have advanced knowledge of the underlying science and don't have any personal skin in the game. Perfect.

[Sarcastr0]

Policy is not and should not be made by scientists, but rather in consultation with scientists.

Elected officials have the same skin in the game the rest of us have.

[Queen Amalthea]

No, policy should be made by amateur yahoos. Some of them stayed in a Holiday Inn last night!

[Don Nico]

"Elected officials have the same skin in the game the rest of us have"

But that does not mean that they are any less ignorant or more prudent than the average citizen.

[Sarcastr0]

That depends on what your political theory of the republic is.

[James Pollock]

"t that does not mean that they are any less ignorant or more prudent than the average citizen."

You picked 'em. Pick less-ignorant and more-prudent next time if you find the current crop lacking.

[Don Nico]

James,
How well did snarks get you by in law school?
or were you content to be at the bottom of your class?

[James Pollock]

I was in the top third, thanks.

[Life of Brian]

Elected officials have the same skin in the game the rest of us have.

It's downright adorable that you think this would be the very first time in recorded history where elected officials would fully and willingly subject themselves to the same rules they institute for the unwashed masses.

[Sarcastr0]

You were talking about vaccinations. Do you think they’re getting the secret good vaccinations or faking those pics of them getting them?

[James Pollock]

They know Donald Trump would, so they assume all politicians would do that. The Donald spread the coronavirus as far and as widely as he could. After all, he was able to use our money to get himself the best medical care and the best treatments that were available, it's not his fault that you didn't do the same. Sorry about your grandma.

[Life of Brian]

Those that want them will certainly get them. Those what do not certainly will not.

Are you suggesting that every single one of them is lining up and getting jabbed on TV? That's even cuter.

[Sarcastr0]

You think our leaders are not getting vaccinated if it doesn't happen on TV?

[Don Nico]

"The Donald spread the coronavirus as far and as widely as he could."
Just one more BS snark. James, try saying something substantive for a change.

[Life of Brian]

You think our leaders are not getting vaccinated if it doesn’t happen on TV?

I addressed that clearly: "Those that want them will certainly get them. Those that do not certainly will not."

Your willful blindness grows old.

[James Pollock]

"James, try saying something substantive for a change."
You don't seem to like it when I do.

[Don Nico]

"our elected policymakers"
In other words those who don't actually have expertise but have the power to impose their will on others.
That is fine for China and other dictatorships but not for the US

[Sarcastr0]

Elected.

Not China.

[Don Nico]

Election does not confer wisdom or good sense.
Example: DJ Trump

[Sarcastr0]

No, but it confers legitimacy. More legitimacy than LoB has, and no less wisdom.

[James Pollock]

Again, see the case of DJ Trump as an outlier.

[Stephen Lathrop]

Don Nico, wisdom and good sense are nice to have in an office holder. A wise electorate would demand those characteristics instead of spurning them, as often happens. But election confers legitimacy, a sine qua non for the power to govern. Before he pissed it away seemingly on purpose, even Trump could claim legitimacy.

[James Pollock]

" even Trump could claim legitimacy."

Trump could claim anything, which is a big part of the problem with Trump.

[Don Nico]

"must regard as a highly experimental treatment with unknown long-term effects. "
Brian, how much do you actually know about genomics? My colleagues, who are recognized experts in the field don't agree with your "must regard as a highly experimental treatment with unknown long-term effects. "
What is unknown is the long term efficacy of the present vaccination. It may require a booster every year. We will have a very good idea about that by next October.

[Life of Brian]

With respect to your colleagues, Moderna and others have been chasing the mRNA brass ring for a long time, and only very recently came up with some way to (maybe!) keep an mRNA therapy with enough of the stuff to be effective from blowing up the recipient's immune system. And since a big part of the original problem was toxicity buildup through repeated dosing, a booster every year (a) doesn't exactly engender confidence, and (b) isn't something they'll have any good safety data on for quite some time.

And the picture can only worsen once you get past pencil and paper and controlled lab conditions. There's no way whatsoever they can speak to any sort of track record for the actual mass-produced product as administered because there is none. Certainly not on this scale or even close to it.

[Don Nico]

The may have been chasing for a long time. BUT in 2020 they caught the ring.
"And the picture can only worsen once you get past pencil and paper and controlled lab conditions."
And you know that how? Your PhD is in genomics or molecular and cell biology?
My colleagues have led major national genomics programs. US pharma has succeeded where others failed.
No one know the length of effectiveness of ANY of the vaccines.
But I'll be happy to see some references to your claims.

[Life of Brian]

The may have been chasing for a long time. BUT in 2020 they caught the ring.

Just in the nick of time, too -- their VCs were starting to get really cranky and they desperately needed to chalk up a win.

In all seriousness, though, I'm glad we've advanced the conversation from "anyone who knows anything about this stuff has no question it's perfectly safe and effective" to "well, yeah, this thing did just pop up last year, but there's STILL no question whatsoever it's perfectly safe and effective."

And setting aside your diploma dick-measuring exercise that likely would make Maggie Thatcher roll over in her grave, what I said above was centered around the lack of long-term evidence from the proponents about the safety and efficacy of this magical planetary alignment from less than a year ago. That's not a "claim" -- that's reality. And reality is something we're in increasingly short supply of these days.

[Sarcastr0]

There's risks in everything, Brian. If that's your thesis, it's trivial. If you want your thesis to go farther, you are not properly equipped to do so, and neither am I.

Deciding on the risk-benefit of a policy is and has always been the job of our policymakers, not each individual. Especially when there are collective action problems.

Because we don't live in an anarchy.

[Stephen Lathrop]

You know Brian, if the whole thing does blow up in a year, and unanticipated side effects do preclude boosters, it likely will still prove to have been worth it. To this minute, with vaccination going on as fast as possible, this nation teeters on the brink of a much worse catastrophe than has yet happened. The current vaccinations notably lessen the probability that will happen, by suppressing opportunities for malign mutations. If follow-up proves impossible, at least the path toward a subsequent potential patch job stands open and partly explored. Unless you know some way to do long-term safety tests on an accelerated schedule, you seem to be blaming vaccine researches for not taking time when there was no time.

[Life of Brian]

Deciding on the risk-benefit of a policy is and has always been the job of our policymakers, not each individual.

Here comes "business as usual" Sarc -- it's been days.

Again, this thread is about forced mass vaccinations. Even setting aside the fact that it's with newly-manufactured-drug using a bleeding-edge, never-before-successful technology, that's a new frontier in and of itself.

And don't bother with the "we make people get vaccine X before they go to school Y at age Z" comebacks. That's not even close to what is under discussion here, and I know you know that.

[James Pollock]

"this thread is about forced mass vaccinations."

Smart people WANT to be vaccinated against communicable diseases. Who cares about what the stupid people want, beyond their ability to harbor the pathogen, and transmit it to vulnerable populations?

[De Oppresso Liber]

One of the things I found most frustrating when I was a GOP member was that data-driven analysis of policy or leadership outcomes seemed to always, and I mean always favor the Democratic position over the GOP policy or leadership.

I used to rely completely (and still do partially) on the principles of liberty with the objective of maximizing personal liberty. That was my definition of "utility" if we must view this through the social science / economist lens. Once Trump became the nominee, with his rather obvious contradictions in opinion and personal behaviors with the principles of liberty and what had been the GOP's platform bullet points up until then, I decided that GOP rhetoric about liberty did not match their actions or intent. In short, the GOP was not the best choice if you favored utilitarian "good" outcomes, nor was it the best choice if you favored individual liberty over utilitarian "good".

And so, what do current GOP and Trump voters think of this: https://www.theonion.com/no-way-to-prevent-this-says-only-nation-where-this-r-1819576527 ?

Once again, the data shows that Democrat leaders and policy outperforms Republicans, and by a pretty decent margin.

What is the current GOP justification for this under performance, now that the GOP has no stated principles, mission statement, or desired policy outcomes? In short, why should anyone not currently convinced vote GOP? Please answer in the affirmative only; no "because Dems are bad".

[De Oppresso Liber]

Wrong link, lol.
https://academictimes.com/states-with-gop-governors-had-worse-covid-19-outcomes/

[James Pollock]

Of course states with Republican governers had worse COVID outcomes. To get a Republican governor, you have to have a lot of Republican voters, and they were all going to vaccine-spreading events before the election.

[De Oppresso Liber]

So a GOP worldview leads to worse outcomes. not much of a modifier.

[rsteinmetz]

The top 3 states by deaths per capita are New Jersey, New York and Rhode Island

[De Oppresso Liber]

Is that a rebuttal of the academic paper? Because it is not.

"Methods: A longitudinal analysis was conducted in December 2020 examining COVID-19 incidence, death, testing, and test positivity rates from March 15 through December 15, 2020. A Bayesian negative binomial model was fit to estimate daily RRs and posterior intervals (PIs) comparing rates by gubernatorial party affiliation. The analyses adjusted for state population density, rurality, Census region, age, race, ethnicity, poverty, number of physicians, obesity, cardiovascular disease, asthma, smoking, and presidential voting in 2020."

[Ridgeway]

First, that "methods" section offers its own rebuttal. We should only be looking at actual numbers, not modelled numbers adjusted for race, population density etc.

Second, I not that they only look at death rates at given points in time. Again, this is an odd choice. Cumulative deaths per million would seem to me by far the best and clearest measure of success/failure.

Taken together, the two points I highlight above only serve to minimize the outcomes we saw in the Northeast, particularly NY and NJ early in the pandemic.

[Bob from Ohio]

We have hard data on cases and deaths.

Each 10 state grouping has a mixture of GOP/Dem governors and a mix of lockdown practices.

"Bayesian negative binomial model "

LOL

[De Oppresso Liber]

If you don't understand it, it must be hocus-pocus!

[De Oppresso Liber]

So in comparing the effects of different methods of leadership, we should not adjust for population density? You do realize that if you do not adjust for factors like that, you end up only analyzing those differences, right?

An unadjusted comparison would tell us very little we don't already know from already available demographic data.

[Ridgeway]

"An unadjusted comparison would tell us very little we don’t already know from already available demographic data."

I am not sure why that is a bad thing -- the actual numbers tell the story.

The responses each state undertook have to be analyzed based on the real world conditions they faced. Saying that NY's response would have been better if it had a lower population density and fewer nursing homes is non-sensical. And saying Utah's response would have been less effective if it had higher population density is similarly silly.

Honestly, the only spectacular failure in the entire country was in the NYC metropolitan area. NYC is currently standing at 367 deaths per million, far and away higher than any other state, and the surrounding suburban counties are also almost as high.

[Ridgeway]

per 100,000, not per million

[Don Nico]

You're correct. The one spectacular failure is singularly the product of DeBlasio

[De Oppresso Liber]

Because "actual" numbers tell you more about a place's population density, rather than the specific effects of specific policies. Which is to say, why bother then, when you can just look up the population density?

You can just say you don't understand why scientists use adjustments to raw data.

And all of this is shaping up to be the typical evasion and focus on semantics rather than engaging the point. This is basically the entirety of conservative thought or philosophy at the moment in america.

Just engage the data honestly, instead of trying to contort the argument into something you think you can "win".

[Don Nico]

DOL,
"Because 'actual' numbers tell you more about a place’s population density, rather than the specific effects of specific policies."
Disentangling the density effect is not easy, is model dependent and requires access to and processing data on a city by city basis and not nation to nation.
I have looked and have seen no reliable analysis of the population density effect. The effect due to average size of household is very weak

[Don Nico]

"So in comparing the effects of different methods of leadership, we should not adjust for population density? "
Disentangling the density effect is difficult, is model dependent and requires access to and processing data on a city-by-city basis and not comparing nation-to-nation.
I have looked and have seen no reliable analysis of the population density effect. The effect due to average size of household is very weak

[Stephen Lathrop]

Ridgeway, do you have any way to adjust your flawed choice of method? Problem is, the places hit first accumulated casualties much longer than the places hit later. There is no apples-to-apples policy comparison to be had in, "cumulative deaths per million."

Policy makers in places hit later not only had the pure shorter-period-of-exposure time advantage, they had a policy advantage available from earlier-exposed places' experience of both mistakes to be avoided, and treatment improvements discovered.

Against that backdrop, with a few stand-out exceptions (Ohio, for instance), red states' neglectful and ineffective policy choices appear shameful indeed.

Unless you yourself are a red state policy maker, it mystifies me why you would be reluctant about an assessment as self-evident as that one. You don't really even need a study to see it. Just compare what is going on right now on NYT Covid case maps. And maybe read up a bit about how Florida has been cooking the books on case numbers. Is it just Florida, by the way? I'm still not clear about a substantive accounting for the nursing home scandal in NY.

[De Oppresso Liber]

Motivated reasoning.

[Life of Brian]

The analyses adjusted for . . . presidential voting in 2020.

Oh, that's the only way they could get the states to stratify they way they needed? Dear god.

[Don Nico]

DOL,
It is difficult to say, when looking at the actual data and considering the highly restrictive and early actions by Gov. Newsom, that CA did much better than the rest of the country.

I don't buy the gross politicization of covid statistics, even though I do think that the lack of immediate action by DeBlasio was near to criminal

[De Oppresso Liber]

I realize it is difficult. That is why people go to school for 7+ years to become PhD's in their chosen fields.

As far as politicization goes, we have 50 states with 50 different covid policies. It is political; that is the nature of the beast.

[James Pollock]

Plus we have information about how the pandemic was handled in several foreign countries, and some of that information is reliable.

[Don Nico]

Yes it was handled poorly in the EU regardless of the right v left status of the government. It was handled well in Australia and NZ. Was that due to SARS exposure? NOt clear.

It looked like it was handled well in China... by lying about the cases in Wuhan alone as well as by imposing marshall law.

And your point is?

[James Pollock]

"It looked like it was handled well in China… by lying"

That's how our federal government tried to deal with it. Well, not the whole federal government, just one, specific piece of it.

"And your point is?"

Intelligence is the ability to learn from experience. Wisdom is the ability to learn from the experience of other people. You seem to lack either one.

[Don Nico]

" That is why people go to school for 7+ years to become PhD’s in their chosen fields. "
Yes, done that and got the tee shirt.

And those 50 states show very little about what the best policy would have been. But I do notice that you have nothing to say to explain the CA experience.

[De Oppresso Liber]

I don't have anything to say because I am not the researcher or expert. I have read and shared that research for our discussion. The study does offer an explanation, but you don't like it. I am not the one being evasive here.

[James Pollock]

"What is the current GOP justification for this under performance, now that the GOP has no stated principles, mission statement, or desired policy outcomes?"

Whaddya mean, no desired policy outcomes? They STILL want desperately to reduce taxes for wealthy people. That one isn't going anywhere. To the GOP, literally everything sounds like a good reason to lower taxes for wealthy people.

[ThePublius]

Since Trump flipped the ninth circuit, could it be that the ninth, in upholding Hawaii's position on carrying firearms outside the home, was inviting the SCOTUS to hear the appeal?

[Bob from Ohio]

"Trump flipped the ninth circuit"

No, its still a Dem majority.

[James Pollock]

As is the population of the 9th.

[Bored Lawyer]

Here is something I came across very recently that is an ethical issue for lawyers. Your opposing counsel sends you an email about a case (or negotiation) and copies his client. May you “reply all?”

An ethics committee in New Jersey just came out with an opinion that says yes. https://www.njcourts.gov/notices/2021/n210316a.pdf

But according to a website five other state bar ethics committees have said no. And the New York City Bar Association has said, it depends. (Naturally.)

This is a novel one to me. What have others done? What are others’ opinions?

[Bored Lawyer]

HEre is the second site. I had to post it separately to avoid moderation.

https://www.jdsupra.com/legalnews/new-jersey-issues-guidance-to-attorneys-6366355/

[Bob from Ohio]

First lawyer has consented to you contacting the client imo. So I agree with NJ.

[Ridgeway]

I have always thought that as long as the opposing counsel is copied, there is no ex parte communication issue -- it is the same as taking directly to their client when you are all in a room together (remember that?). The only exception would be if you were trying to game the situation, for example, by trying to get the client to admit to, or agree to, something before the lawyer had a chance to see and respond to the emails.

This comes up all the time in contract negotiations where you basically copy everybody on each team with every new revision. It is generally far too cumbersome to run everything through counsel and have them need to distribute to their team.

[Sarcastr0]

As discussed last week, how are the Biden dementia folks around here take the press conference?

[Queen Amalthea]

Soros generated hologram, duh.

[Jimmy the Dane]

It was nicely scripted with his media collaborators.

[Queen Amalthea]

I like how the totally senile guy followed the script...

This is the thing about conservatives today. They can't just say 'this guy Biden, his policy X Y and Z are awful.' It has to be 'secret media, performance enhancing drugs, messages via earphones, etc., conspiracy to hide his obvious terrible dementia!!!'

The party of ideas folks, wacky conspiracy ones admittedly, but ideas nonetheless!

[Jimmy the Dane]

Well tell me how the media isn't essentially an arm of the DNC these days?

Biden falls down the stairs, nothing, absolutely nothing from domestic media. Had to go European press to get coverage. Keep in mind it wasn't just a misstep, he fell down repeatedly all in a row which is a symptom of failing motor skills.

Trump takes a gingerly walk down a slip ramp and the media is johnny on the spot with that coverage suggesting we need to 25th Amendment him (once again).

So yeah, the media is covering up here and it wouldn't surprise me if they were actively engaged in an effort to do so.

[MatthewSlyfield]

Not to mention the speech where he referred to "President Kamala Harris".

Yes, prior presidents have made misstatements, but this is a big one.

When was the last time a sitting president made a misstatement about who the current President is?

[Queen Amalthea]

"The Continental Army suffered a bitter winter of Valley Forge,” he continued, “found glory across the waters of the Delaware and seized victory from Cornwallis of Yorktown. Our army manned the [unclear]. It rammed the ramparts. It took over the airports. "

And that was *with* a teleprompter.

Conspiracy thinking certainly is sloppy.

[Sarcastr0]

Yes, prior presidents have made misstatements, but this is a big one.

You're too smart to think that's probative of anything.

[Jimmy the Dane]

What is telling is it seems to be the actual truth and just isn't your little flub...

[Sarcastr0]

Which you know how?

[James Pollock]

There's a strong history of Conservatives just KNOWING things. And you can't use any amount of fact or reason to convince them otherwise than what they just KNOW.

[James Pollock]

"When was the last time a sitting president made a misstatement about who the current President is?"

In January, when Donald Trump said
"Quite frankly, we won that election in a landslide."

[Queen Amalthea]

"Well tell me how the media isn’t essentially an arm of the DNC these days?"

Because they're clearly not. The front page headline on the two 'mainstream' newspapers I read today were critical of Biden's handling of the border. That's a funny way for the arm of the DNC to act.

"he fell down repeatedly all in a row which is a symptom of failing motor skills."
Jesus the sloppiness of conspiracy thinking! People fall down stairs and steps all the time.

[Jimmy the Dane]

You are familiar with the concept of plausible deniability and maintaining cover, right?

[Queen Amalthea]

Here's where we get the conspiracy theorists good buddy 'unfalsifiable theory.'

MSM attacks Democrat, well, they're just maintaining cover in they're acting as DNC arm. MSM doesn't attack Democrat, see, it proves they're acting as the DNC arm.

Hint: the DNC would never attack a Democratic President to maintain cover or any other reason.

[Jimmy the Dane]

Running soft criticism of under the guise of being objective is an old communist playbook trick. Everyone knows that. Maintains legitimacy for the source. That is what we have happening here. Standard tactic.

[Stephen Lathrop]

Holy crap. It's the John Birchers again.

[Don Nico]

The issue of falling down really is no big deal. Folks should get over it.
The refusal of the White House to allow major news media to visit and photograph the conditions of the detention facilities for children at the border (especially after photos were provided by a Dem representative) is something to complain about.

[James Pollock]

"The refusal of the White House to allow major news media to visit and photograph the conditions of the detention facilities for children at the border [...] is something to complain about."

OK. I'll complain about it. Trump shouldn't have tried to do that. The (alleged) reason they tried inhuman detention tactics was to try to convince the foreign parents not to send their children to the border unaccompanied. That won't work if you keep it secret.

[Don Nico]

Hey, James.
The leak by the Dem congress man was THIS past week and concerned the BIDEN policy.
Again you find nothing useful to say about a problem right now; instead you try a deflection that does not work. It is pitiful.

[James Pollock]

The way you imagine Biden is a failing intellect while longing for Trump is, indeed, pitiful.

[James Pollock]

"Biden falls down the stairs, nothing, absolutely nothing from domestic media."

Except for when they ran video of it on their newscasts. And made fun of it on the late-night talkshows.

" he fell down repeatedly all in a row which is a symptom of failing motor skills."

or a bum knee. ask Gerald Ford about how it can happen.

"Trump takes a gingerly walk down a slip ramp and the media is johnny on the spot with that coverage suggesting we need to 25th Amendment him (once again)."

Gee, maybe mentioning how proud he was to have passed the demanding tests (person, man, woman, camera, television) wasn't the absolute best way to fight the belief that his brilliant, brilliant mind was going. He was one "tiger blood" from going full Charlie Sheen.

[Don Nico]

One of the many problems of Trump was that he could never follow the script.

[Nige]

He couldn't even follow a coherent thought.

[James Pollock]

"I like how the totally senile guy followed the script…"

Well, the last one totally had problems sticking to script.

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

You seem disaffected, Jimmy . . . resentful toward your betters.

[James Pollock]

There's just so darn many of them.

[Jimmy the Dane]

Turns out it WAS a completely scripted event, complete with cue cards.

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9404629/Images-taken-President-Joe-Bidens-press-conference-using-cheat-sheets.html

[Bob from Ohio]

Did he have to climb stairs first?

Elderly cognitive problems are not linear. There are ebbs and flows for while.

Even at the end stage there are lucid moments.

[Sarcastr0]

Unfalsifiable thesis, eh Bob?

Lame.

[Bob from Ohio]

We'll see.

He use multiple page typed notes. Unusual no?

[Sarcastr0]

...no?

[Nige]

So he's capable of following multiple page typed notes...? I mean, that's usually the sign of an organised mind.

[James Pollock]

"He use multiple page typed notes. Unusual no?"

Unusual no.

[James Pollock]

Bob's claiming he's still capable of lucidity, even if it doesn't show.

[Don Nico]

Bob,
My 98 year old mom needs a walker, yet see seems sharper than you show by your comments. Physical deterioration with age does not mean mental deterioration.
Is Biden very smart. Nope. But he is passable.
Was Trump smart? He showed himself the fool whenever he opened his mouth,

[Bored Lawyer]

This is the perfect example of how this board has gone downhill.

Ever heard of the phrase "beating up on a straw man?"

I looked at small clips on Youtube from the conference. He is definitely slowing down and is not mentally all there. That does not mean he cannot make some kind of an appearance at a press conference. Especially consideing he has a sympathetic audience.

As I mentioned before, I have been before judges who are losing it, yet can often seem lucid, even sharp. They still should not be judges, IMO. And certainly not the president.

[Jimmy the Dane]

I think it is more liberals are grasping for any form of confirmation bias. I think it is a symptom of their overall mental health deteriorating. That is why they demanded social media platforms engage in never before used internet censorship, that is libs could not even begin to process the counterfactuals.

Half the country is close to a full mental breakdown and it is starting to get dangerous. The adults in the room are going to need to start asserting more control or it is going to get bat shit crazy.

[Queen Amalthea]

"I think it is more liberals are grasping for any form of confirmation bias."

Holy pot calling the kettle black.
People don't believe Biden is incompetent with dementia because such people don't even follow a script. It's you guys that have this desperate confirmation bias, you can't just say Biden is wrong or that he's not smart he has to actually be demented. It's always the most extreme with conservatives (but I repeat myself).

[Bored Lawyer]

Now that you have gotten that out of the way, how about addressing the real issue. Is Biden in declining mental health, and mentally slowing down? Is that a good thing for the country? (My answers: Yes and No.)

[Queen Amalthea]

I don't see any evidence that Biden has anything especially wrong with his mental health, no. Falling down stairs certainly doesn't show that nor do misstatements, these things are quite common with people in perfectly good cognitive condition.

I don't think he's a very smart man, but nothing seems wrong with him.

The question is, why do you need something to be wrong with him so badly? Can't you oppose a politician because you think their policies are wrong instead of constantly invoking some scandal/conspiracy thing?

[Jimmy the Dane]

Translation: You do not want to believe Biden is losing it.

[Don Nico]

While stumbling on stair is not great, it is also not worth fussing over.
Try discussing Issues of substance such as several foreign policy stumbles: Korea, the EU, Mexico, China, and Russia.

[James Pollock]

"Translation: You do not want to believe Biden is losing it."

No, I don't want to believe it the way YOU want to believe it. Which is bad enough to start imagining clues.

[Brett Bellmore]

I think falling once on the stairs is something anybody can do.

Falling a second time moments after, when you're going to be taking special care? THAT isn't a good sign.

Falling a third time? That strongly suggests he's got some medical problem going on.

Of course, falling on steps doesn't imply mental health problems. It could be neurological, either CNS or peripheral. Slowed reflexes combined with reduced feeling in your feet are enough to accomplish that, that's what put my mother in a wheel chair, though she was sharp as a tack and her joints were functional. She just couldn't reliably balance anymore.

I will give him extra points for determination, though. He got up each time and kept going.

As for his mental state, the guy has had multiple brain bleeds, and is approaching 80. Of course he's not firing on all cylinders anymore, the real question is how fast he's declining, not whether he is. I find it somewhat concerning that, before Biden, I never, EVER, heard the phrase "call a lid", and certainly not in the context of somebody who's supposed to be fit to take the proverbial phone call at 3AM. It isn't a 9-5 job with weekends off, after all.

I personally don't think Trump will be fit to be President by the time he's Biden's age, either. Elderly people shouldn't think they're fit for that kind of office.

[James Pollock]

"I personally don’t think Trump will be fit to be President by the time he’s Biden’s age, either. "

Some concession, given that he was unfit at Trump's age last year.

[James Pollock]

"Half the country is close to a full mental breakdown and it is starting to get dangerous."

Agreed, but you aren't in the half you think you are.

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

" He is definitely slowing down and is not mentally all there. "

The only thing that could stop these concerns about Pres. Biden's health among conservatives would be an acute case of adult-onset bigotry.

[Bored Lawyer]

Thank you for proving my point.

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

My point is that you dislike Pres. Biden -- and therefore discount his faculties -- because he is not a racist, not a old-timey gay-basher, not a stale misogynist, not an obsolete clinger, not an immigrant-hater. If he suddenly veered toward being a roundly bigoted jerk, you would adore him, with most of the other clingers.

[Don Nico]

Anita Hill might have a different description of Ole White Joe.

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

Keep flailing, clingers. It won't change anything as our society continues to progress against your wishes, but it might make some of you feel better as you await replacement.

[Don Nico]

Again, you have no reply, clinger.

[James Pollock]

Grasp at whatever straw you can reach.

[Sarcastr0]

Bored, I had a discussion last week with at least Commenter_XY and maybe others depending on how much you think replies incorporate threads above by reference.
Commenter et all said this press conference would be important in their determining Biden's cognitive function.

It is not a strawman.

And your post that Biden could totally still be losing it, guys! Is just lame.

[Bored Lawyer]

"how much you think replies incorporate threads above by reference."

I incorporate everything I have ever written anywhere by reference. My first grade essay about my summer vacation is incorporated into this post right now.

[Commenter_XY]

An interesting press conference, Sarcastr0. Something in it for everyone.

[Sarcastr0]

I found it pretty boring to be honest.

[James Pollock]

Press conferences are almost inherently boring, unless the person giving it has trouble reading their script.

[ThePublius]

Weeks of preparation; pre-screened questions; notes; FOX NEWS black balled; went blank in the middle of answers a couple of times. God only knows what they "pumped" him up with.

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

Fox News had special access for four years. It should experience similarly special lack of access for four years.

No free swings, clingers.

[Don Nico]

And how do you explain not allowing the news media to see child detention at the Southern border?
When you figure that out, tell us about free swings, clinger.

[James Pollock]

The same way the last guy did... letting the press in disrupts the orderly operation of the facility. In other news, the news doesn't normally report on prison riots from inside the prison, either.

[Don Nico]

Whataboutism, James. Try a real reply for a change.

[James Pollock]

Reading doesn't seem to come readiiy to you. but if you keep trying, maybe you can get past the first clause of comment.

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

"And how do you explain not allowing the news media to see child detention at the Southern border?"

In general, I favor media access.

[Sarcastr0]

God only knows what they “pumped” him up with

Sekret drugs are a dumb conspiracy theory.

[Jimmy the Dane]

No secret drugs required. A simple short course of prednisone would probably make him lucid for 1-2 days. And seeing it WAS a scripted event this is probably what happened.

[Nige]

No proof of ANY of this, obviously.

[Jimmy the Dane]

I think it will be an awesome day in the history of our Republic when the press secretary can come out and say, "the President has been given an a course of amphetamines and will be conducting his press conference shortly...."

[James Pollock]

That doesn't sound very awesome.

[Sarcastr0]

It wasn't scripted. Having notes for expected questions is not the same thing. I've drafted the same thing for Congressional testimony.

And anyone with a senile family member will tell you, prednisone won't do what you're describing.

[Jimmy the Dane]

Prednisone will promote physical vitality given in the right doses in the short term. There is some evidence that it might improve mental acuity as well. But what it would do is cover up his physical ailments. As far as Biden clearly slowing down, this is evident from just watching him over the last year. Older people still have "good days" and this could have been one of them. You also can't argue that these events are heavily scripted and he is clearly being given direction in how to perform. Does that mean everyone knows he is losing it and they are trying to cover it up? Not exactly. Does it point to the fact that he is probably not all with it and needs crutches to make him look effective? Definitely.

And yes those were cue cards. Take a look at them. Those are not just "briefing notes" as you try to gaslight us into believing.

[Brett Bellmore]

Gah, I hate that stuff. I was on it during chemo, nasty stuff. Didn't take my antacid far enough in advance the first time, and was hoarse for a week from the acid reflux.

Mind, I was taking enough to choke a horse, maybe it isn't quite so bad in moderate doses.

[James Pollock]

Whereas your guy just didn't bother to talk to the press unless he could call in to some random show and take it over.

[Sarcastr0]

Half the country is close to a full mental breakdown and it is starting to get dangerous. The adults in the room are going to need to start asserting more control or it is going to get bat shit crazy.

Anyone else see Jimmy slowly morphing into Ed?

[Jimmy the Dane]

I think with our powers combined we turn into one of those bigger awesome looking Transformer things....

[James Pollock]

Rita Repulsa the one you're grasping for?

[mydisplayname]

I have been following Sasha Volokh's Monday poetry readings and look forward to a reading of the Charlottesville classic -- not one from (say) The Raven, but instead from the City Mayor who gave sworn testimony regarding events in the city. https://dailycaller.com/2021/03/24/charlottesville-mayor-vulgar-poem/

If possible, we should do this as a responsive reading: one line from sworn testimony, one line from the poem.

[floridalegal]

By the time democrats get through with their election guarantees, does anyone think that dead people will be allowed to be removed from the voter rolls? If there is a valid/legally filed death certificate, can that person be removed from the voter rolls without litigation? With ballots being sent to all "residents" instead of citizens or registered voters, how do you know if the person residing at the location is a legal voter? When ballots are sent to the person who used to live at the address, what is to be done with the ballot? For people who have residences in say NY and FL and they have voted in both, do ballots get sent to both state residence addresses? If there is no voter ID required for ballots, how do you know who is the resident?

I'm all for the motor voter, and every conceivable means to register voters. Early voting, at least 2 weeks. The number of early voting locations, sufficient to handle at least 50% of the average total number of voters with an assumption that each voter needs say 10 minutes to actually vote. Some formulas based upon the ability to process 50% of the average in locations that have the capacity based on an equal density. No excuse for absentee ballots but, they are actually requested. Early votes and absentee ballots can be prepared and processed before election day but counting can start on election day. Florida is the third-most populous state and over 80% of votes were counted in 24 hours. No ballot harvesting.

[James Pollock]

"By the time democrats get through with their election guarantees, does anyone think that dead people will be allowed to be removed from the voter rolls? If there is a valid/legally filed death certificate, can that person be removed from the voter rolls without litigation?"

Depends on how, exactly, Republicans set up the process. For example, will they allow challenges to counting a vote because a person with a similar name has died? If the process is that sloppy, yeah, I'd expect a lot of litigation.

The answer, of course, is one the Republicans seem likely to oppose, require periodic re-registration. Instead of fighting over which registrations to delist, unregister everybody and make them sign up again. That change would mostly affect groups that tend Republican, so I would expect them to fight it tooth and nail.