Thursday Open Thread

What's on your mind?

Comments

[Jimmy the Dane]

I'm glad the "forever war" is done, personally. I wish the pullout from Afghanistan was less chaotic because you know we had 20 years to plan it, but what do you expect when the military spends all of its time teaching soldiers about "white rage" and critical race theory instead of doing military stuff.

One thing I am not happy about is how some on the right are "celebrating" the Taliban as some sort of heroic, base opposition to the left. Yeah apparently we spent 20 years trying to jam an extreme, radical feminist agenda down the throats of a non-Western culture, acting as occupiers and colonists, but there should be no joy in the fact that Taliban are back in charge.

And, the government has lost absolutely all credibility when it comes to their excuses for gun control. They just left about a million firearms sitting around a country that were used to overthrow an actual, recognized, (sort of) legitimate government. How many of those people holding actual machine guns had to pass a background check, pay taxes on their new possession, and jump through endless regulatory hoops to get that gun? Yeah we all know the answer. If we are to believe the public policy justifications the left uses to abridge Second Amendment rights, then the government just condemned Afghanistan to a generation of endless gun violence and suicides by not controlling the supply of firearms. And, if the government actually believed that hooey then they would have had intricate plans to remove each and every American provided gun. Instead, they have now lost any and all credibility to put supply restrictions on domestic firearm ownership here because of the actions abroad.

[Brett Bellmore]

"One thing I am not happy about is how some on the right are “celebrating” the Taliban as some sort of heroic, base opposition to the left."

Where are you seeing this celebration? I must admit I've missed it, but I would admit there's enough diversity of thought on the right that it can't be ruled out as happening in some corner.

[Sarcastr0]

The usual bunch of bomb-throwers I would call the fringe except their messages seem to drive a lot of people around here even.

Nick Fuentes ("The Taliban is a conservative, religious force, the U.S. is godless and liberal. The defeat of the U.S. government in Afghanistan is unequivocally a positive development")

Proud Boys ("These farmers and minimally trained men fought to take back their nation back from globohomo. They took back their government, installed their national religion as law, and executed dissenters ... If white men in the west had the same courage as the Taliban, we would not be ruled by Jews currently")

Tucker Carlson ("They don’t hate their own masculinity. They don’t think it’s toxic. They like the patriarchy. Some of their women like it too. So now they’re getting it all back.")

[AmosArch]

At least thats just an offensive opinion and not an offensive and completely delusional opinion. Like calling Biden fleeing with his tail between his legs when the Taliban stroll in, stranding tons of Americans and equipment 'a brave decision to finally end the war'.

[Sarcastr0]

Nothing says bravery like forever war!

[AmosArch]

English to Sarcastrese

Unilaterally blowing past a withdrawal date extending the war with no plan then running away like a fat kid from a diet only when the enemy rolls in = Brave war ending peacemaker

Expecting a President not to royally screw up a withdrawal by stranding and getting many Americans killed and then leaving tons of equipment to the enemy = Bloodthirsty warmonger.

[Sarcastr0]

Trump giving the Taliban a date certain sure seems like the manly policy, sure.

You don't care about the Americans killed over the past 20 years, because you're not a serious person.

[Armchair Lawyer]

A date is conditional, dependent on goals, metrics and other items. It's not a hard date by any measure. As the withdrawal demonstrated.

[Sarcastr0]

So much for 'unilaterally blowing past a withdrawal date' I guess.

Your arguments disagree with each other.

[Armchair Lawyer]

Biden screwed up. Bad. Real bad. Because he didn't have a good understanding on items, among other reasons.

A date was given. But it was dependent on certain actions by the Taliban. Which they didn't adhere to. Because of that, it was conditional and should've been negotiated differently.

Why on earth Biden had all the TROOPS leave before the American Citizens, we don't know. Why we were leaving Americans Citizens at the gates of the airport...we don't know. Why Biden forced the closure of Bagram (a far more easily defended airfield to evacuate from)....we don't know.

[Sarcastr0]

AL, forgive me if I don't give a lot of weight to your finding Biden is bad yet again.

[Don Nico]

S_0,
You don't need forgiveness from the Armchair. He never misses the opportunity for arguing in bad faith.

[Armchair Lawyer]

The greatest irony here is, I'm 99% sure that Don has blocked me.

Yet he agrees with much of what I say, and still feels the need to respond to many of my posts.

[Don Nico]

"You don’t care about the Americans killed over the past 20 years"

As any serious executive and competent manager knows, sunk costs are close to irrelevant in making decisions for the future.

[Reallynotbob]

And poker players.

[Don Nico]

Poker players also!!!

[Kazinski]

People are not 'sunk costs'.

You will never get them back, and there is no point in losing more lives in a failing cause, but they should never be regarded as sunk costs.

[Sarcastr0]

And yet the people focusing on the pullout are treating them thus. Because they think this is a weakness in Biden they can hammer.

But they're too blinded by partisanship to see they're wrong - pulling out is politically popular, the initial chaos has calmed down considerably, and the loss of life is dwarfed by the price in lives Biden stopped spending.

[Kazinski]

That's certainly not true. There hadn't been an allied combat casualty in Afghanistan 18 months, Biden's botched have us 13 in a week, so that is hardly saving lives.

And I hope you aren't claiming fewer Afghan lives will be lost during the Taliban takeover.

We did need to get out of Afghanistan, but we needed to do it right, not Biden it.

[Brett Bellmore]

"then running away like a fat kid from a diet only when the enemy rolls in"

You must have missed the news: The Taliban encountered less resistance than they'd expected, arrived at Kabul ahead of schedule, and actually offered to wait until the evacuation was done before taking over, since they hadn't been prepared to take over the city that early.

We turned them down, and insisted that they take the city over immediately. The Taliban rolled in because we told them to, turned down their offer to wait.

[Don Nico]

What could you expect from an inept leader in the White House.
His actions on the eviction moratorium also showed his weakness as a leader. He caved to his OLC and let himself be pushed around by the extreme left of his party with their "Shake it and see" recommendation. The result was a quick humiliation.
By refusing the Taliban's offer he bought another humiliation that he has no choice but to answer with defiance that it was his plan. Thereby he bout a humiliation by ISIS-K. Now the NYT writes that Afghanistan is on the verge of economic collapse. When that happens (or is precluded by massive Chinese intervention) it will be a further repudiation "by history" of the foolishness of Biden's way to disengage.
The MSM may buy the line that history will show that Old White Joe made the right decision, but that is hardly a certainty

[Armchair Lawyer]

Case in point 1 for Don agreeing with me, as above.

[Brett Bellmore]

History WILL show that he made the right decision. Have you looked at party affiliation in history faculties lately?

[Don Nico]

Brett,
Close but no cigar.
You just argued that US Historians "WILL show that he made the right decision."

[Nige]

If it was the wrong decision it was less wrong than going in, and less wrong than staying in. There is no right decision. Everything about it is wrong.

[WuzYoungOnceToo]

and less wrong than staying in

Is, "It wasn't that we left, it was how we left" really that difficult to understand?

[Nige]

It's clear that you want it to be a meaningful distinction after twenty years of 'how we invaded and occuped.' But it really isn't.

[Don Nico]

Nige,
I dismiss your comment as you actually start from a place that is actually stupid from a national security perspective. You chalk everything up to imperialism. You're wrong.

[WuzYoungOnceToo]

But it really isn’t.

I can't even imagine the level of stupidity required to conclude that there is no meaningful distinction between getting out of a situation in a relatively ordered and competent manner...such that lots of people and material aren't killed and/or abandoned - as well as humiliating yourself in the process...and what was actually done.

[Nige]

I can’t even imagine the level of stupidity required to conclude that there is getting out of a situation in a disordered manner is not worse than getting into a disordered situation and staying in and perpetuating that disordered situation for twenty years. Now that is incompetent and humiliating.

[Nige]

Don Nico, invading Afghanistan has only brought about net negative national security benefit, along with a vast quantity of other net negatives that will continue to accrue long into the aftermath. Obviously it's not just imperialism, it's an obscenely bloated military budget driving a deeply dysfunctional foreign policy.

[AmosArch]

Obama Christ man, NOBODY is arguing that we stay in Afghanistan this has NOTHING to do with staying or leaving. We are talking about the manner of leaving. This is like killing your wife and then defending yourself saying 'well did you want me to stay in a toxic marriage?'

I really don't understand the new narrative among progs to play dumb like this but all theyre doing is embarrassing themselves.

[Nige]

I know you're talking about the manner of leaving. I'm just saying that the manner of leaving is entirely consistent with the manner of everything else to do with the invasion and occupation, but has the unique benefit of having left. To leave with competence and no humiliation, then the twenty years there would have to have been spent actually establishingg a stable, functional army and government that had popular support and a growing economy. That did not happen. Spectacularly. So there was never going to be any other manner of leaving.

[WuzYoungOnceToo]

I can’t even imagine the level of stupidity required to conclude that there is getting out of a situation in a disordered manner is not worse than getting into a disordered situation and staying in and perpetuating that disordered situation for twenty years.

Damn...you are just about the dumbest son-of-a-bitch alive.

[Nige]

Not as dumb as sons of bitches who started and supported the war in Afghanistan, excepting maybe the sons of bitches who got rich off it.

[Don Nico]

At least let's hope that the Niges of the world won't be protesting about the fate of Afghani women and girls.

Under his so-called "military occupation," a generation of Afghan girls grew up free from the paedophilic abuse of Talibani and their cowardly male sympathizers.

[Nige]

Except for ones who died by the thousands in the yearly death tolls, of course, and now the Taliban are back becuase at the end of the day, Afghan girls growing up free from the paedophilic abuse of Talibani and their cowardly male sympathizers was all just PR.

[Doug Huffman]

Where am I seeing this celebration? Why, from the leftist Corrupting News Network, of course.

“ Several concerning trends have emerged in recent weeks on online platforms commonly used by anti-government, White supremacist and other domestic violent extremist groups, including "framing the activities of the Taliban as a success," and a model for those who believe in the need for a civil war in the US, the head of the Department of Homeland Security's Office of Intelligence and Analysis, John Cohen, said on a call Friday with local and state law enforcement, obtained by CNN.”

“White supremacist praise of the Taliban takeover concerns US officials.” (www.cnn.com/2021/09/01/politics/far-right-groups-praise-taliban-takeover/index.html)

[Brett Bellmore]

There's a difference between recognizing that the bad guys won, thinking that you can draw some useful lessons from it, and celebrating their victory.

The US military thought Rommel was a kick ass general, and one to learn from, that didn't mean they approved of their own asses getting kicked.

[Sarcastr0]

You do not, in fact, 'gotta hand it to' the Taliban.

They are no Rommel. They're not even a Lee.

Admiring their theocratic ruthlessness is not something people who want good things for America will do.

[Brett Bellmore]

They beat us like a rug, if they're no Rommel, we're even less so.

Your problem is that you tend to confuse categories, and so are reluctant to recognize competence in people you find morally deplorable. The have to be generally bad, they can't be "good" in the sense of competence, and "bad" in a moral sense.

[Don Nico]

"They beat us like a rug, "
Nice expression.
While the generals can share some blame, we must remember that a strength of the US is that the military is controlled by our civilian, political leaders. That is where the buck should and does stop

[Sarcastr0]

Our aims were never going to be realized, no matter how much military strength we had.

The problem was not our strength. I blame our military a bit for acceding it could accomplish nation building like this, our intel apparatus more, and our politicians a whole lot - first the neocon utopian imperial nonsense, then the cowardice to not leave and look bad.

[Sarcastr0]

Note that all of this blame was true the moment we went in, except for all the post-Trump Presidents being craven on the issue until Biden.

[Don Nico]

"except for all the post-Trump Presidents being craven"
there are no post-Trump Presidents except for Biden!

[Sarcastr0]

I musta meant post-Bush.

[Commenter_XY]

Don Nico, I agree. This was a failure of leadership. The original mission was over by the end of 2002. When POTUS Bush changed the mission, it was a strategic blunder. We should have left back in 2002, and never mind the Pottery Barn.

[Sarcastr0]

I didn't think we should have gone in then, and I still don't think it was a good idea. What was the mission, if not just petty revenge? Not worth the blood and treasure.

Back in the day, I thought Iraq was important. I no longer think so. The whole post 9-11 adventurism was just an awful idea.

[Don Nico]

I think that we have a disagreement about the wars initiated by Mr Bush. I never thought that the Iraqi invasion made any sense at all. Regime change was a bad idea. Yes, that would have meant countenancing "the brutal dictator." But he was holding back the tide of Islamist fundamentalism and Iranian adventurism.

In contrast Afghanistan was a safe harbor for militant jihadis and it now will continue to be so. It was then and is now a force for destabilizing US-friendly interests in Pakistan, the owner of the Islamabomb. The biggest flaw perpetrated under both Bush and Obama was the nurturing of widespread corruption in Afghanistan. Mr Trump's movement to leave was just another example of his nativism with little thought given to the next moves down the chessboard. Biden bought right into that as a sop to the extreme left and added his own ingredient of poor planning, poor strategic vision and shoddy execution.
Especially now with China striving the be the top global superpower, US interests in that part of the world have never been higher.

[Sarcastr0]

You're smarter than I was in Iraq. In my defense, I was young.

I know that's how it was sold, but don't think jihadis have had much of an issue recruiting and training since we got into Afghanistan.

The idea of invading to stabilize the region seemed hinky to me even then, and seems to have been roundly disproven.

We sure do have interests in the region. This war did not do much to further those interests, nor could it have.

[Don Nico]

S_0,
I clearly remember the speech by Ted Kennedy opposing the action in Iraq. It was spot-on accurate and inspiring.

[Kazinski]

I don't admire their theocratic homicidal governing style, or their 7th century outlook.

But anyone that doesn't look at their successive humbling of 3 superpowers at their height, the Brits in 1840, Russians in the 80's, and now the US, with at least some admiration for being willing to fight for their country, their culture, the way they want it, is spiritually lacking.

I wish the Taliban lost,I hope they still end up losing, but not to see anything to admire in these ignorant hillmen lacks imagination.

[Sarcastr0]

The Taliban is not the people of Afghanistan.

[AmosArch]

I still believe it was justified punishing the taliban for harboring AQ. Where we went wrong was deciding to attempt to turn the place into a Middle Eastern San Francisco. And of course the handling of the withdrawal. Unfortunately the lessons of history often become simplified over time and this just may turn into LOLZ intervention is always wrong no matter what Lulz in the textbooks.

Even though Biden was too weak hold them to the one thing that still justifies military intervention, I hope the Taliban are more sensible now and will turn away Osama 2.0 in exchange for free reign to have 5 wives or whatever they enjoy doing over there. It would really be unfortunate to have to decide if we want to spank them again after another attack.

[Don Nico]

Amos,
the Taliban are not the ruthless primitives that they are made out to be.
Having won a military victory, they will behave as rational rulers for a couple of months to 1) get funds released and most importantly to gain diplomatic recognition from several key countries: China, Russia, KSA, Qatar, Turkey and a view more (Japan would be a great coup).

[Don Nico]

"it was justified punishing the taliban for harboring AQ"
Good point Amos.
In that sense the Taliban have a direct contributory responsibility for the N. Korean nuke program.

[Armchair Lawyer]

Indeed. People on both sides wanted to pull out, and it was justified.

The execution however was horribly bungled. A pull out like this needs to be careful, well executed, and allow for flexibility and tactical counterstrikes, as well as potentially leaving a limited number of troops for embassy protection and so on.

[Jimmy the Dane]

I understand the cost of removing equipment is expensive and then you end up junking most of it when it gets back here, but we found a few trillion dollars to pump into their country so pretty sure we could have found enough cash to bring the stuff back to scrap. Again, it is not like we didn't have enough time to plan a wind down.

I fear that it was bungled because Biden is effectively not at home and the military brass seemed more concerned about critical race theory than protecting America. A lot of people are saying "well it is the military they can do multiple things!!!!" but the military is just like a big corporation these days. And I can tell you once a big corporation gets fixated on a company wide initiative it becomes all consuming. Last summer when BLM was all the rage departments and teams that had nothing to do with anything public facing were getting dragged into meetings, seminars, trainings, or being "voluntold" to do the next trendy thing involved with company outreach, etc. It was a major time suck and distraction especially for areas that have essential duties that don't have a lot of flex. I can only imagine the level of distraction all this was for the military in total seeing it was probably corporate initiative on crack kind of level.

[Sarcastr0]

It's not our equipment. We gave it to the Afghans.

Maybe you think we should have appropriated it back, using 20-20 hindsight.

Losing in Afghanistan was baked in the moment the balloon went up.
Blaming critical race theory is pretty silly.

[Jimmy the Dane]

This is where it is clear you have drank the kool aid and have no awareness of anything beyond your nose.

It was "given" to the Afghans because we didn't want to deal with the logistics of removing all the assets. This is not hindsight. It was simple lack of planning. When the brass is too busy sitting in conference rooms talking about critical race theory they don't have to time to do things like plan an orderly withdrawal. Instead you get a really sad version of the Keystone Kops, Taliban style.

Getting out of Afghanistan was going to be a net loser, but didn't need to be the complete loss it ended up being. That is on the generals and Biden. And they ought to be ashamed of themselves.

[Sarcastr0]

It was given to the Afghans over the past 2 administrations. Don't make things up.

Things could have gone better, but actually after the chaos of day 1 they went amazingly better than anyone expected.

This is not going to be the partisan cudgel you take it for, and your desperate moral dudgeon shows you realize that.

[Jimmy the Dane]

That is some revisionist history right there in the making! Does the DNC contract with Sarcastro Inc. to spin historical events like that?

[Bob from Ohio]

"amazingly better than anyone expected"

13 US service people dead. Hundreds of US citizens left stranded. Even dogs abandoned.

Most of the "SIV" visa holders left behind. Most of the Afghans we did get out were just normal refugees seeing a Golden Ticket.

Brits and other allies hopping mad.

Its all good with ole Gaslighto though.

[Sarcastr0]

Not what I said, and you know it.

[Bob from Ohio]

Pointing out why it was in fact not “amazingly better than anyone expected”

I think most people expected us to get, for example, all US citizens out. I think most people expected us to cooperate with our allies.

If you meant it could have been worse, that is true. It can always be worse.

[Sarcastr0]

The Air Fore pulled off a miracle, no matter how much scorn you try and gin up.

[Don Nico]

S_0,
Jimmy didn't blame CRT. He blamed the military and the White House for taking their eye off the ball for political expediency.

[WuzYoungOnceToo]

Jimmy didn’t blame CRT.

What anyone actually does/doesn't say is of zero concern when the only arrows in your rhetorical quiver are weak straw men.

[Nige]

Be nice to think that people realise what an absolutely criminal waste of money and resources the US military is and that foreign policy lead by militarism is inevitably nothing more than costly catastrophe. The whole thing's just a blood-smeared machine for funneling public money into private hands.

[Don Nico]

Yadda yadda yadda

[Nige]

Budda budda budda

More war games!

[Don Nico]

Live with it.

[Nige]

Unlike thousands of Afghan civilians over the last twenty years.

[Bob from Ohio]

Also Unlike thousands of American civilians killed on 9/11.

The Taliban harbored Al Queda, they refused to surrender Bin Laden and others so we properly invaded.

[Nige]

Brought them all back to life, didn't it. Oh, no, it just left a lot more people dead and trillions of dollars gone and now the Taliban back. Maybe it was a stupid fucked-up response capitalised by private contractors to make big bucks off blind vengeful patriotism and you fell for it, sucka.

[Bob from Ohio]

"Brought them all back to life, didn’t it."

Of course not, don't be stupid. prosecuting ordinary murderers doesn't bring the victims back either yet we do it.

"trillions of dollars gone"

First, it was only $837 billion for the Afghanistan war. It mainly went to salaries and supplies for our troops.

Normal US budget is 3.5 trillion a year. Most of which is just as wasted. 1/4 of that over 20 years is not going to break us.

[Nige]

Fiscal conservatism - a few billion completely wasted on an utterly useless and pointless war is fine. Oh, yes, also, lots of people died.

[Bob from Ohio]

"Fiscal conservatism" is dead. Nobody believes in it.

The Taliban are responsible for the death of all the people you are so concerned about. They were beaten and there were free and fair elections but they rejected those.

[Don Nico]

"a few billion completely wasted on an utterly useless and pointless" social program that just destroyed motivation for self-emprovement in the bought off group. But it sure did buy their votes.

[Nige]

Fiscal conservatism, like Christian family values and the party of law and order, were never really alive in the first place.

'The Taliban are responsible'

The US started the fucking war, fucked up the occupation, then lost. The Taliban, it turns out, were never beaten. The free and fair elections resulted in a government that lasted as long as a fart in a gale. Own the blood of your fuck-ups.

[Nige]

'But it sure did buy their votes.'

Bush's second term.

[Aunt Teefah]

"they refused to surrender Bin Laden"

This is just flat wrong - the Taliban offered to turn over bin Laden in exchange for no invasion. Bush said no.

[Bob from Ohio]

No. It was a bad faith "offer" tantamount to a refusal after our attack started.

"If the Taliban is given evidence that Osama bin Laden is involved" and the bombing campaign stopped, "we would be ready to hand him over to a third country", Mr Kabir added.

But it would have to be a state that would never "come under pressure from the United States", he said.

[Don Nico]

You caught Teefah in the lie, Bob.

[Aunt Teefah]

That was a pretty good deal compared to the alternative. Unless you’re a weapons manufacturer or a heroin trafficker, anyway.

[Nige]

What 'lie?' The Taliban made the offer, but the US preferred to invade, occupy for twenty years and then leave ignominously, all the while arterially spurting blood and money, instead of negotiate.

[Brett Bellmore]

The lie is claiming they offered to turn him over. What they offered to do was let him move to any other country that would also harbor him.

[James Pollock]

The Taliban killed approximately 0 people in the United States.

[Kazinski]

So you are against the 3.5 trillion reconciliation bill too right?

[Sarcastr0]

Infrastructure bill, not reconciliation.

You have a different definition of waste than Nige.

[Nige]

A trillion overspent on fixing a single footbridge would be of substantially more value than about three-quarters of the US military and the entirety of the Iraq and Afghanistan adventures.

[Brett Bellmore]

Not untrue, provided they fixed the bridge by laminating $100 bills using epoxy, so that all the money actually got spent on the bridge.

Unfortunately, I'm sure they could find some way to spend the money that was actually worse than burning it.

[James Pollock]

A group of intolerant, fundamentalist religious misogynists supporting the Taliban? Shocker!

[Sarcastr0]

Deep Dive 6/7: The oath. On the oath judges and public officials take, whether or not it’s still relevant today, and what the oath has to do with originalism.

[Gotta say, this is where I find Baude the most out there. So buckle up!]

[Sarcastr0]

1. The oath
Judges take an oath to protect and uphold the law. This is a hook for the positive turn. If you need to uphold the law, and the law is originalism, so judges gotta be originalist.

Wait, so the oath does not allow a plurality of views of the law? That seems ridiculous on its face, given the sometimes violent plurality of views of the law that existed in the Founding era.
So walk it back a bit, to say it's maybe more a forbiddance - don't do these things that depart from the law.

Baude thinks the oath shows that we need to all care about what the law is - that this is an important inquiry.
[This is getting far afield to me. Who has ever said it wasn't an important inquiry? All judges care what the law is, and think that what they are doing is upholding the law. Most people that take an elite job seek to do that job with professionalism and quality, if only for their own self-image. In this modern era, those who do not seek to do so will not be dissuaded by a mere oath. Originalists saying 'ah, all judges must agree with us now or be forsworn' are being pretty silly.]

The positive turn says that what judges have been doing is largely originalism, so the oath is to keep in keeping on.

So does the oath forbid a judge from adding a new way to look at the law to the methods judges have previously used? [You mean like originalism in the 1980s...?

What about the fact that the oath hasn't changed since the Founding. Does that not require some continuity in the Founding? If the US got conquered, and the rump US was in Cuba, would the oath change? [No...]
Or what if a judge was a Trojan horse and when getting on the bench went full Sharia Law. That would be against the oath [but does the oath do any work here, or is it just our political system and the general polity?]
Or what about a judge changing the age of the President or the setup of the Senate? Is that in? Under the common law constitution, it would be in [But nobody argues this. So the oath has the same effect as the tiger repelling rock.]
There was an appeals judge who thought current law required giving Puerto Rico representation now. Is he breaking his oath? He does cite treaties. [You are allowed to be sincerely wrong, even when you're a judge.]

Is using the oath like this originalist? Even the anti-canon cases, Korematsu, and Plessy, and Dredd Scott - those judges suffered no consequences. Though there was a 10 year delay to appropriate funds for a bust of Taney into the Supreme Court after he died. [Which is not the same thing at all.]

[Sarcastr0]

2. Fun asides

So the way West Virginia was created was like a bunch of loyalists went into West Virginia, consented to carving it off from Virginia, and then went back and accepted that consent. It's a weird legal fiction, but not many will listen to the Confederates and disenfranchise West Virginia.

Much of the Civil War was conducted under a disenfranchisement of much of the Confederate people and governments, with very small loyalist groups consenting to a lot of stuff. Which gets into some philosophical/liberal theory about who gets to speak for the governed in the case of a lost civil war.

And finally, the text of the Constitution in how to create a state has some troubling semicolons that if read like today would seem to forbid making a state by carving out a part of another state. But if you read those semicolons as an originalist would, it's all good.

Baude hates literally as meaning figuratively. [Agreed, though literally as an intensifier is legit IMO]

[Brett Bellmore]

I've previously noted that one shouldn't use the period around the Civil war as a basis for constitutional precedent, because the Constitution wasn't really being followed at the time.

"And finally, the text of the Constitution in how to create a state has some troubling semicolons that if read like today would seem to forbid making a state by carving out a part of another state."

If you read it back then it forbade doing it, (Without the consent of the state legislature.) back then, too. Which is why they bothered with the legal fiction. If it hadn't been read that way, there wouldn't have been any need to pretend the state legislature had consented.

[Sarcastr0]

This is just part of the fun asides, it's not part of any originalist thesis, but isn't this example, at least under your reading, a pretty strong attack on strict formalism?

Without maintaining this legal fiction, we are forced to get rid of West Virginia. And this chaos is for the marginal benefit of...defending the rights of the conquered after the Civil War.

Maybe ideological purity is not the natural state of man; some flexibility is required, or else we spend all our time dealing with past failures to maintain formal consistency and no time dealing with actual issues that effect currently living people.

[Brett Bellmore]

I've already said that the problem for originalism is that so much non-originalism has taken place, that originalists who work within the legal system are faced with the temptation to rationalize violations of originalism as somehow OK, because undoing them simply isn't possible.

Whereas originalists outside the legal system are free to just say that the emperor is naked, because they are not courtiers anyway.

Perhaps originalism needs some sort of formal doctrine of adverse possession, to deal with defeats that are so far back there's no prospect of undoing them?

[Brett Bellmore]

Or maybe a statute of limitations would be a better analogy.

The least an originalist should demand of a case like West Virginia, though is that nobody do that again!

[Sarcastr0]

Constitutional liquidation, then.

I'm all for that, as a functionalist/pragmatist.

And thus WV's origins become a fun factoid and nothing more.

[Brett Bellmore]

Constitutional "liquidation", as I understand it, involves accepting the deviation as actually legitimate. Whereas a statute of limitations doesn't imply that a crime didn't take place, it just bars doing anything about it.

It's alright for originalism to not insist on reversing mistakes that are beyond the practical capacity to repair. It's not alright for originalism to take the step of affirmatively declaring that they're not mistakes.

[Sarcastr0]

I'm not seeing a difference in your distinction.

You want some kind of history court that declares past decisions legit or not, even if that's an entirely academic distinction?

I suppose that's a fine thing for legal academia to get into, but not something I'm going to get very worked up about.

It's funny - in science I care most about the things that have zero practical import on human life. The more useless the better!
In law, I only care about the practical import.

As an engineer, you are probably the opposite.

[Brett Bellmore]

I don't need a history court, but yes, I want originalists to recognize as mistakes, even mistakes that can't be corrected.

The import of this is very practical: If you say "X was a mistake, but it's too late to correct." you'll refrain from X-like mistakes in the future. If you say, "X wasn't really a mistake." because it's too late to correct X, you won't refrain from X-like mistakes in the future, having declared X not to be mistaken.

You need to be able to recognize even mistakes it's too late to fix, AS mistakes.

[Sarcastr0]

For precedents with an applicable upshot sure (like Korematsu, Quirin, etc. etc.) but for WV? If we're coming out of a civil war, carving up a state doesn't seem like it'll depend much on formal anything.

[Brett Bellmore]

What am I saying? That actions taken in the context of the Civil war shouldn't be considered good precedent for the constitutionality of those actions. If you declare such actions to be constitutional, not just that they occurred during a constitutional hiatus, then what's to stop committing them without a civil war?

There were a lot of things that happened during the Civil war that could be replicated in peace time, if you were lacking in scruples, and careless of political consequences. Refusing to seat members of the opposition, for instance.

[James Pollock]

“And finally, the text of the Constitution in how to create a state has some troubling semicolons that if read like today would seem to forbid making a state by carving out a part of another state.”

Virginia was busy pretending that the Constitution allowed them to secede, so why not go ahead and pretend that it ALSO allowed the west Virginia counties to secede as well?

[Brett Bellmore]

It's the difference between something the constitution was silent on, (Secession.) and something it explicitly prohibited. (Splitting up states without their permission.)

There was a legitimate argument that secession was constitutionally permitted. There wasn't such an argument for splitting Virginia.

[Sarcastr0]

3. OK, back to the oath.

Oath-wise, Baude was surprised he got some real personal pushback with this oath argument. Like, personal phone calls! [My personal theory is that this is due to the feeling that the enforcement of oaths feels a bit McCarthyist loyalty oath. It's just silly to me (and Adam!), but I can understand the violent reaction some older folks may have.]

An example of oath enforcement's issue comes up in immigration law - you need to take an oath. So the US tried to keep out socialists and the like. The Supreme Court said no, that oath is much more general about America being generally good. But maybe if you try and overthrow the government that would break your oath. [Again, this is not an oath that matters, since you already can't do crimes.]

Baude continues his argument that the oath is just about judges doing something totally out of left field, but even surprising and unconventional conclusions are OK. [So is Alito, who is not an originalist, breaking his oath?]

Baude doesn't really want any oath enforcement (like impeachment or even jail), except to think about what the law is because the oath is to the law.
But oathbreaking is still a moral statement, even so. Saying Ginsberg is foresworn with low character...Also note the asymmetrical argument. Nonoriginalists allow originalism as wrong, but legitimate. Originalists say not only are you wrong, but you're violating your oath. [And for some around the VC secretly originalist, but intentionally lying to get outcomes you want]
Baude points to the arguments about Bork, and how he has been called an astrologer for relying on what is basically soothsaying. [Bork's originalism was particularly nutty. And academia can be mean; the arguments in the polity are indeed asymmetrical here.]

One 9th Circuit judge, Harry Pregerson, in his confirmation hearings in 1979, when asked what he would do if the law and his conscience conflicted, said he'd go with his conscience. And got confirmed. But that was before the current dog-and-pony show. Even weak norms are hewed to in the modern ritual of judicial legitimacy.

[Sarcastr0]

Next time: the last part of the Deep Dive: Partisanship and originalism!

But we're not done - there are two other episodes of the Dissenting Opinions podcast that were particularly meaty food for thought I want to spotlight.

After that it's back to our regularly scheduled partisan slapfighting.

[Sarcastr0]

States That Cut Unemployment Benefits Saw Limited Impact on Job Growth: Half of U.S. states ended enhanced unemployment insurance payments early ahead of nationwide termination of benefits for millions of people

Economists who have conducted their own analyses of the government data say the rates of job growth in states that ended and states that maintained the benefits are, from a statistical perspective, about the same.

Economists caution against concluding from these results that expiring benefits had no effect on employment. First, they say it might be too early to detect such an effect. Second, offsetting effects from state reopenings and virus-related restrictions by local governments could be masking the impact of the expiring benefits.

The nationwide expiration of the enhanced benefits in September will offer a much larger case study. By early next week, about 11.2 million Americans will lose some form of federal unemployment benefits, according to estimates from forecasting firm Oxford Economics. About 3.5 million people lost benefits in the 25 states that cut them this summer.

https://www.wsj.com/articles/states-that-cut-unemployment-benefits-saw-limited-impact-on-job-growth-11630488601

[Brett Bellmore]

Perhaps at that point our local school district will be able to hire enough bus drivers to resume normal bus service.

It's absolutely astounding how many help wanted signs are out there in this area, they're popping up like candidate signs in the week before an election. But most of the businesses around here are offering reduced service because they're understaffed.

Currently the unemployment rate is, per the BLS, twice what it was in 2019. At the same time the labor force participation rate is a couple percent lower than then, and seems to be holding steady.

It's hard to square this without concluding that something has left a substantial portion of the population unmotivated to actually TAKE jobs. Enhanced unemployment and expectation of Covid checks seems like a decent candidate for the demotivator.

[Sarcastr0]

Are you using job openings as a proxy for the unemployment rate?

BLS says the current unemployment rate is 5.4%. In 2019 it was 3.5%. Are you using some other measure?

If someone isn't taking jobs, then they wouldn't be part of the unemployment rate.

[Krayt]

People who quit looking for jobs and so are no longer counted as unemployed was a funny new club to beat Bush over the head with. It is no longer funny as a club.

[Sarcastr0]

It's a description of the statistic, not a club.

I'm taking issue with Brett's argument, not saying real unemployment is actually super high, which is indeed a silly argument that is deployed by both sides.

[James Pollock]

After the Great Recession, a lot of people were underemployed. Working, but for much less than they theoretically could have or should have earned (as an example, almost everybody who graduated with a fresh new JD in 2009 or 2010 did not find a job waiting for them in the legal field, so they wound up doing some other kind of work, trying to figure out how to make student-loan payments. At present, there are a great many work opportunities for people who pass food out the window into a car. The places where people buy food out the window into their car are seeing a lot more cars at their windows, because for a long time people weren't allowed to come inside, sit down, and eat.
Prediction: over the next five years, there will be more jobs involving networking and network security, and fewer jobs involving managing office space where everybody who works for a business comes to the same building to do their work. This will be seen as a great travesty by those who long for the old days of getting up in the morning and driving through heavy traffic to get to the office. If businesses underinvest in making sure their information networks are properly secured, it's going to be a great couple of years for scammers and ransomware operators.

[Brett Bellmore]

You know what? I'd missed the fact that the BLS had made the Y origin of their graph something other than zero, and just eyeballed it.

My bad, but theirs as well. A violation of one of the cardinal rules of data presentation, but I wouldn't have fallen for it if I'd been paying proper attention.

But, still, labor force participation is down, unemployment is up, and everybody in the area is hiring and understaffed, so it's not like people are unemployed because they genuinely can't find work. Heck, the plant down the road advertises that they hire on the spot: Walk in, and they'll put you on the line right then and there, and you get started being paid immediately.

They're unemployed because they don't want to find work so long as the unemployment benefits keep rolling in. The only way that ends is if we stop paying them to be unemployed.

[Sarcastr0]

That's fair - I've fallen for that graph trick a lot myself.

Unemployment being up since 2019 doesn't seem like it's the fault of the President, whether Trump or Biden.

[Brett Bellmore]

But it seems to me that, in enhanced unemployment, and other mechanisms by which the government has contrived to send people money without their having to work for it, we have an obvious and volitional explanation for why the unemployment rate, when it rebounded after its lockdown low, didn't rebound all the way, even in the teeth of massive demand for hiring.

There's no reason to throw up our hands and say it's nobody's fault, when we can see right before us something that's actually being deliberately done, and would by basic economic principles be expected to have such an effect.

[Sarcastr0]

It's almost as though demand is not leading to higher wages for some reason.

[Brett Bellmore]

Well, yes, and that's perfectly explicable in the case of the school bus drivers: The school district doesn't HAVE to pay more, they can just tell parents, "Find some way to get your kid to and from school, you're on your own!" and not worry, because it's not like you can take your money elsewhere.

A little harder to explain for private enterprise. I suppose they're reluctant to make "sticky" wage adjustments when they expect the government to shortly cease paying potential employees to turn down jobs. And in some cases the wage increases that would be enough to bring in the employees in the face of those payments would be so high that the work done wouldn't be worth the wage.

I expect that automation at fast food joints is going to accelerate dramatically. And if the payments don't end soon, wages will start up.

Well, they'd better start up in any case, given accelerating inflation.

[Sarcastr0]

Not sure why you brought up public jobs - I'm not seeing any numbers about low participation in that sector, mostly retail and service and the like.

You can't argue that the demand for jobs is a real number, if companies - for whatever reason - are not adjusting their wages. You can't look to economics to figure out causality if the issue is noneconomic factors making the market degenerate.

[Brett Bellmore]

I brought up public jobs because I'm having to find some way to get my kid to and from school because of an emergency announcement from the school district that they no longer have enough bus drivers to maintain a functioning bus system.

[Sarcastr0]

Huh. Wasn't tracking that.

That sucks.

[Sarcastr0]

I'm one of those people not worried at all about automation. Past precedent shows that among it's many talents, capitalism is really good at finding productive things for people to do. (And I don't think that's a bad thing at all).

[Brett Bellmore]

Sure, if you're not paying them to be idle. An idea which is gaining increasing traction on the left, and like so many things, Covid has been used as an excuse to try it out.

The Covid checks, and continued enhanced unemployment benefits in the teeth of job demand, represent a back door implementation of a universal basic income.

[Sarcastr0]

The left wants UBI, which is paying people period, not to be idle.

But I'm also not sure paying people to be idle causes the idleness people assume it does. Humans are not market robots, and many like to work.

I took a pay cut to take the job I'm in because I love what it does.

[Brett Bellmore]

It's the difference between instant results, and long term results, I suppose.

I've worked all my life, if tomorrow I won the powerball lottery, I'd keep working, I'd just be doing something I wanted to do, rather than something somebody was willing to pay me to do. I grew up with a "work ethic". That's pretty common under a system where you have to work to eat, growing up in a culture where as a child you're forced to do chores, and working becomes an ingrained habit.

Not everybody has a work ethic, a lot of people only work because they have to, give them enough money to live on, and they'll just kick back. That's the immediate impact, that we're witnessing now.

But, the long term impact is the destruction of the work ethic, by removing the conditions that generate it in the first place.

[Kevin Smith]

On the subject of automation, the McDonald's near my house is testing fully automated order taking and payment at the drive through. You basically order from a Siri (or Alexa) type of AI, then pull around to swipe your card at the card reader. Your first (and only) human interaction is when they hand you your bag of food

[WuzYoungOnceToo]

You basically order from a Siri (or Alexa) type of AI, then pull around to swipe your card at the card reader. Your first (and only) human interaction is when they hand you your bag of food

I've said for several years now that those demanding a $15/hr (or higher) minimum wage are in for a rude awakening when they find how many workers who receive minimum wage can be cost effectively replaced by cheap and reliable consumer-grade electronics and software systems.

[James Pollock]

The fast-food establishments discussed above are now offering $15 and sometimes higher, because they were the only ones going to work while everybody else worked from home.

[WuzYoungOnceToo]

because they were the only ones going to work while everybody else worked from home.

You are, as always, completely and utterly full of crap.

[BadLib]

Are you sure that "human" handing your your bag of food is really a human or just a very convincing likeness?

[Brett Bellmore]

I expect the really convincing likeness would screw it up less often.

[James Pollock]

"They’re unemployed because they don’t want to find work so long as the unemployment benefits keep rolling in. The only way that ends is if we stop paying them to be unemployed."

Absolutely. Take engineering, for example. Any fool can be an engineer, so you just take anybody off the street and tell 'em "you're an engineer, now!" and put them to work designing bridges.
Or take my own field: Anybody who can learn TLAs can become an IT security professional. It's not like it's complicated, or anything. Keep the bad guys out, and let the good guys in, that's all there is to it.

[Armchair Lawyer]

It's pretty remarkable.
I've seen so many help wanted signs around, it's amazing. I've seen stores like Dunkin Donuts saying "closed at 2 PM due to lack of labor". I've seen Chipotles with "only taking mobile orders, no orders in person" due to lack of labor.

[Brett Bellmore]

You pay people not to work, shockingly, a lot of people take the money.

[Sarcastr0]

So far, that is not borne out by the statistics. It may yet be, but maybe stop presenting it as a clear truth for a bit.

[Brett Bellmore]

"So far, that is not borne out by the statistics."

I'd like to know which statistics you think aren't bearing it out. Because the statistics I'm looking at sure as heck show reduced labor force participation and elevated unemployment.

What would you consider to be statistics bearing it out?

[Sarcastr0]

https://www.wsj.com/articles/states-that-cut-unemployment-benefits-saw-limited-impact-on-job-growth-11630488601

[Brett Bellmore]

Well, yeah, that does suggest that it isn't just state policies that are at fault.

[Sarcastr0]

Aye.

[Armchair Lawyer]

Indeed.

[jb]

Another possibility: the pandemic reset people's priorities and expectations, and now you have to pay someone more to be interested in the same unfulfilling crap job that they had before. Obviously, this is made easier if you have the financial wherewithal to be choosy*, but as Sarcastr0's data seems to show, the choosiness doesn't seem to be associated with the enhanced unemployment benefits.

* There's some economic literature that says being able to wait and find a job is overall better for the economy since it allows for better matching of skills to role, so some amount of temporary additional unemployment may not necessarily be a bad thing.

[Commenter_XY]

jb....here is something additional to consider. And what I am going to write I think is complementary to your point. One contributor factor to the employment paradox. Parents are hamstrung with schools which impose sudden quarantines (i.e. Little Johnny contracts Covid, now the whole class stays home). What can you do? They are stuck. It is not like Little Johnny's Mom (or dad) is going to 'not' take care of him. So they are not going back...yet. They can't.

I manage a number of Moms (and Dads) in professional roles. It is hard on them. In my 1:1 meetings, they talk about the difficulties.

We need children back in school ASAP. That will materially help more people back into the workforce.

[James Pollock]

Children doing online school need to be supervised. The ones physically in school are being supervised. Parents who can work from home largely took that option. My niece did most of 2nd grade on a laptop. So did my graduate-student daughter.

[BadLib]

Also don't forget the eviction moratorium. If someone can't be evicted for non-payment of rent they just eliminated a major expense by not paying rent so don't need as much money to "live" on. Of course, many such people don't think ahead and realize that they will eventually be evicted and then may find it very difficult to rent again due to their record of failure to pay.

I think the interesting effect will be seen after both the unemployment payments have been cut back (in amount and duration) and evictions gain full steam (the courts are going to be swamped for the next few months in states that don't have their own continuing eviction moratoriums). I suspect the number of "help wanted" signs will begin to drop significantly in a few months.

[Brett Bellmore]

What's going to be interesting is next spring, when people start doing their taxes, and discover that those advances on their child tax credit that they casually spent weren't free money, and they now owe a huge chunk of change to the IRS.

Since it was transparently obvious that sending out those checks with a complicated opt out would either result in no net benefit, because people adjusted their witholding, or huge tax bills next spring, I think those huge tax bills were the intended result.

The goal is to make it politically impossible for the Republicans to oppose the Democrats sending out big checks to the voters shortly before the midterm elections.

[Krychek_2]

Regarding the new Texas abortion law, I can't possibly be the only person to whom the following has occurred:

The law effectively has no disincentives for filing false or frivolous lawsuits; the only people bearing the cost are the defendants. You don't get attorney's fees or costs if you are a prevailing defendant.
So what is to stop pro-abortion activists from filing lawsuits en masse against the law's backers untruthfully claiming to have seen them do something that facilitated an illegal abortion? They could even form a corporate entity so the individuals doing the suing wouldn't be personally part of it. The law's backers would then find themselves in the same snare they set for the abortion providers, being bankrupted by defending against frivolous lawsuits. They wouldn't be able to get the suits tossed on summary judgment since whether they did, in fact, facilitate an illegal abortion is a question of fact for the jury, and their denials wouldn't be sufficient for summary judgment. The plaintiffs could then dismiss the cases on the eve of trial, after the defendants have spent a lot of money defending themselves.

As an officer of the court, I'm not advocating that; in fact, I would find it appalling. But no more appalling than the rest of this ill considered law.

[Illocust]

I'm pretty sure you could file a civil case against anyone who filed a false case against you for damages.

I'd also say that lawyers who filled such claims knowing they are false could get sanctioned, but that really only happens for either entirely political cases or cases without any political ramifications. So if be pretty hit or miss.

[Illocust]

But you otherwise bring up a very good point. DA's have been making the news recently for abusing their power by refusing to prosecute people who are violating other people's rights. The problem is the concentration of power in one person's hands. There is no way to override a DA except to wait until election time.

This can be extremely unjust in situations were evidence degrades over time and even statutes of limitations might even pass.

So the question is how to fix it. Allowing private individuals to circumvent the DA in cases were crimes are obvious seems like a good idea, but the issue with that is the one in a thousand person who will abuse it. If you have a population of millions, that's a lot of abuse.

Another better solution might be having multiple DA's with overlapping jurisdiction at least within districts with large populations.

[Brett Bellmore]

I like that latter suggestion. Or maybe roving DA's elected in state wide elections, instead of local?

[Krychek_2]

There would be no need for lawyers to file such claims. An abortion rights attorney could draft the necessary forms and then make them widely available for plaintiffs to proceed pro se.

Yes, you can file a suit for abuse of process. Which is why when opponents of this law go shopping for plaintiffs, they would need to find people who are judgment proof.

[Life of Brian]

An abortion rights attorney could draft the necessary forms and then make them widely available for plaintiffs to proceed pro se. . . . Which is why when opponents of this law go shopping for plaintiffs, they would need to find people who are judgment proof.

[nod nod wink wink officer of the court appalling oh btw here's how they need to set up that thing they DEFINITELY shouldn't do...]

[darkknight9]

" The law’s backers would then find themselves in the same snare they set for the abortion providers, being bankrupted by defending against frivolous lawsuits."

Unless they are folks that get qualified immunity from such suits, I would think.

[Krychek_2]

You don't get qualified immunity for facilitating an illegal abortion, and besides, they would be sued for things they did as individuals, not as office holders. Same theory under which a judge doesn't have qualified immunity if he drives drunk and kills someone.

But there's a broader issue here. There's always a broader issue. For the past several years, the right has essentially been blowing up democratic norms and institutions to achieve its policy goals, and the one it just blew up -- the whole notion of standing, that you can't sue someone unless you personally have suffered injury -- is a pretty big one.

One of the reasons we have democratic norms is that they hold in check the worst aspects of political behavior. Once they're gone, it's Lord of the Flies.

Republicans have been banking on Democrats conforming to democratic norms even if they don't, and for the most part so far they've been right. That's why the Senate still has a filibuster. But there will come a tipping point at which Democrats say, if the only way to win is to blow up institutional norms, then we're going to do it too. That's how things escalate. And this is not going to end well.

[darkknight9]

Sorry, I assumed that "The laws backers" meant the legislators that wrote it. My bad.

[Krychek_2]

Oh, you do sue the law's backers. You file a complaint claiming they personally helped to facilitate an illegal abortion.

[Brett Bellmore]

"For the past several years, the right has essentially been blowing up democratic norms and institutions to achieve its policy goals,"

I personally consider that "Elections are to be conducted according the the laws in place when the election is held" to be a pretty important democratic norm, and the left blew that one up pretty thoroughly last year.

Trying to pass HR1 a couple weeks back by holding a vote at 3 in the morning without advance notice, foiled only because a Republican had gotten tipped off and showed up to note on the record the lack of a quorum, was a pretty big violation of democratic norms, too. We have quorum rules for a reason, after all.

Norms have been falling like dominoes for at least a decade now, at an accelerating pace. I really think our political system is in the end game now.

[Sarcastr0]

They weren't trying to pass HR1. They knew there were Republicans on the floor.

And no, there was no tip, or if there was it wasn't needed - having party coverage on the floor is standard procedure.

We don't live in a political thriller.

[Armchair Lawyer]

"They weren’t trying to pass HR1. They knew there were Republicans on the floor."

I mean....seriously? This is the argument?

[Sarcastr0]

Yes, the argument is that the secret plot that Brett posits was trivially untrue - it wouldn't have worked unless the GOP messed up big time, and the Democrats knew that.

So rather than some insidious House of Cards thing, it is just a symbolic vote to appease factions within the Democratic Party.

We don't live in a political thriller.

[Armchair Lawyer]

And if "the GOP messed up big time"?

Would they have passed it?

[Krychek_2]

There's a difference between not looking a gift horse in the mouth -- of course they would have passed it -- versus actually planning in advance for that result. It's the functional equivalent of playing chess with someone who screws up and loses his queen, both rooks and a bishop all in the same move. If it happens, of course the other guy will take advantage of it, but nobody seriously expects it o happen.

[Armchair Lawyer]

Let's instead say they were actually trying to pass the bill. The odds were low, but they were trying to pass it.

Because that would be accurate. Rather than what Sarcastro said.

[Krychek_2]

Armchair Lawyer, you mean like all those times the GOP House tried to repeal Obamacare, knowing full well that their efforts would go nowhere, but they sure kept trying. Around 50 or so symbolic votes, as I recall.

Now, is there any doubt that had the Democrats screwed up big time and given them the opportunity to actually repeal it, that they would have done so? Of course they would have repealed it. Just like the Democrats would have passed this had the GOP screwed up. And in both cases, the blame would have belonged to the party that screwed up, not the party that took advantage of it. That's how politics -- and lawsuits -- work.

[Armchair Lawyer]

Krychek....

You've already said that if they could have slipped it past the GOP, they would've passed it.

HR1 has already passed in the House. The Senate just tried to pass the same bill via unanimous consent. I don't know how you can simultaenously argue they weren't trying to pass it, but if they did pass it, they would be happy....

[Krychek_2]

Every week I blow two bucks on a lottery ticket. I have no realistic expectation that I'll actually win, but boy, I sure would be happy if I did.

[Brett Bellmore]

They tried to hold a vote at 3 in the morning with a handful of Senators present. It didn't work because a Republican happened to be present.

Now, I'm open to evidence that the Democratic leadership arranged for Cruz to be there, if you've got it.

But trying to hold a vote on passage sure looks like trying to pass something, to me.

[Sarcastr0]

Not 'happened to be,' Brett.

Parties don't leave the floor unattended when the House or Senate is in session.

I interned on the Hill, and our office would get calls for volunteers for floor coverage all the time. Sometimes at awkward hours.

[Brett Bellmore]

And all it would have taken was a 5 minute bathroom break, and HR1 would be 'law'.

[Krychek_2]

Brett, if the Republicans are so incompetent that Cruz had scheduled a five minute bathroom break at the wrong time, they would have deserved HR 1 being law. See my response to Armchair Lawyer above.

[Armchair Lawyer]

Krycheck....

So they were trying to pass it then.

[Krychek_2]

Armchair Lawyer, please stop with the false alternative gotcha attempts. They're completely disingenuous.

[Armchair Lawyer]

It's not a gotcha.

You want to argue they weren't trying to pass it when they were trying to pass it.

It doesn't work. Pick one.

[Krychek_2]

It's one thing to do something that you have no realistic expectation of accomplishing (but which you'll happily take if lightning does strike and you actually pull it off), in which everyone is aware of what you're doing, you're not hiding it, in fact you're trumpeting it as loudly as you can, but everyone knows the other side will simply block. It's something else entirely to deviously come up with a plan calculated to actually work through deception and subterfuge. If the Democrats had told the Republicans to go home for the night because nothing more was going to be done that day, and then passed it as soon as the Republicans left, you'd have a better case.

[Brett Bellmore]

Look, Krychek, if you attempt to hold a vote on passage of a bill, you're attempting to pass it, because it passes if you succeed.

Just scheduling the vote without a quorum is a gross constitutional violation, even if the courts refuse to enforce that clause.

[Bob from Ohio]

"the one it just blew up — the whole notion of standing, that you can’t sue someone unless you personally have suffered injury — is a pretty big one."

So melodramatic,

The concept of "private attorney general" to enforce civil rights and environmental laws has been around for 56-60 years and it was Democrats that created it.

[Sarcastr0]

This one weird trick of deputizing partisans to avoid constitutional review is not going to leave anyone a winner, Bob.

[Bob from Ohio]

MAD kept the nuclear peace for 50 years.

But my point is this is just an extension of a long time concept.

[Sarcastr0]

Nuclear bombing is also just an extension of a long time concept.

This isn't a MAD situation, and I very much hope Dems don't start passing similar laws, though I have little hope of that.

[Bob from Ohio]

"I very much hope Dems don’t start passing similar laws"

Let them.

In chaos there is opportunity.

[Nige]

All flavours of Taliban agree on that.

[Don Nico]

K_2,
My reading is that the Texas law is not meant as a serious state policy, but as a well constructed attempt to force SCOTUS review.
Maybe that is too cynical.

[Krychek_2]

I don't see how you can get SCOTUS review of this law. The pro abortion side can't sue anyone because there's no one to sue; it's any private individual who wants to file one of these lawsuits. And the defense would have to lose both a trial and an appeal to even get to the Supreme Court, and the only respondent would be the private individual who sued. Procedurally, I have to admire the sheer cunning of it; there may be no way to get this case to SCOTUS on the merits.

[jb]

Can't the Supreme Court review it in the exact same way that they can with Transunion LLC vs. Ramirez and with the exact same outcome: the plaintiffs lack standing do to suffering no actual injury even if the legislature has explicitly said that they should.

[Krychek_2]

No, because in this case the Texas legislature conferred standing by statute.

[jb]

Right, that's what Congress tried to do with the FCRA as well, but SCOTUS says you still need to suffer a particularized harm to have standing.

Or maybe your point is that Texas is conveying standing in state court, so Article III standing doesn't matter? Now that I write that, it probably makes sense.

[Krychek_2]

That's exactly right; federal standing is far more restrictive than state standing. If your state legislature passed a law giving me standing to file a lawsuit asking that you and your wife be divorced because I think each of you could do better, that would be one loony law but it would probably survive a standing challenge. If Congress passed the same statute, probably not so much.

[Noscitur a sociis]

And the defense would have to lose both a trial and an appeal to even get to the Supreme Court

Why?

[Don Nico]

Thanks for the analysis, K_2.

[Ben_]

Leftists play dishonest games with laws and almost 50 years later someone finally comes up with an effective counter-move in their game. Leftists claim it’s not fair.

[BadLib]

I think SCOTUS should have granted an injunction against the Texas law but see logic in the majority argument now that we know their reasoning. However, "status quo" seems to harm no one (assuming one believes in the precedent of Roe and Casey) pending resolution on the merits and the inverse can't be said of not granting an injunction.

However it's interesting that this law shares traits with some laws that "liberals" seem to love.

One is the California's law on handicap access to public accommodations which is primarily enforced via civil suits by lawyers who specialize in exhorting money from restaurants whose ramp may be a 1/4" too narrow or 0.1% too steep or whose 'handicapped parking only' sign got knocked over a day earlier and wasn't replaced immediately.

The other are laws that allow civil suits to continue against gun manufacturers who make perfectly legal products that function safely as advertised, sell them completely within the bounds of the law to FFLs, and advertise them in perfectly legal ways - yet frivolous suits against them (such as claiming that how they are marketed somehow contributes to mass shootings) aren't dismissed and the defendant granted legal expenses.

[Noscitur a sociis]

The law effectively has no disincentives for filing false or frivolous lawsuits; the only people bearing the cost are the defendants.

Texas Rule of Criminal Procedure 13 prohibits filing frivolous pleadings, and provides for sanctions which appear to include attorneys fees.

They wouldn’t be able to get the suits tossed on summary judgment since whether they did, in fact, facilitate an illegal abortion is a question of fact for the jury, and their denials wouldn’t be sufficient for summary judgment.

Why not, since the plaintiffs presumably wouldn't be able to produce any admissible evidence that they had? (Indeed, unless the plaintiffs expressly lie, I wouldn't think they'd even be able to get past a motion to dismiss.)

[David Nieporent]

Not sure what the rules of criminal procedure have to do with anything.

[Noscitur a sociis]

*civil

[David Nieporent]

Okay, except the statute expressly says that courts may not award fees to the defendant under the Texas Rules of Civil Procedure:

(i) Notwithstanding any other law, a court may not award costs or attorney's fees under the Texas Rules of Civil Procedure or any other rule adopted by the supreme court under Section 22.004, Government Code, to a defendant in an action brought under this section.

Whatever else you can say about this law, it is well-crafted to do what it does. It's like they actually got a bunch of intelligent, competent lawyers together and said, "Please brainstorm any strategy you could use if you were a defendant in a case like this," and then they closed off every one of those strategies.

[Krayt]

Rachel Maddow just signed a $30 million dollar a year contract. I don't know if she subscribes to Democratic plans to increase income taxes considerably on the rich, or the even more radical (and arguably unconstitutional plan) to simply start seizing 6% of the wealth of the rich, but if so, she can go a long way to convincing me of its wisdom by doing so voluntarily. Donations to government are accepted!

Don't wait for it. Put your money where your mouth is.

I'll add her to my current list of Hollywood loudmouths doing this: _________ .

[Sarcastr0]

When Al Gore himself is made of carbon.

I get you feel being rich and liberal is hypocrisy, but that just says a lot about the reductive way you see the opposition.

Even allowing the words you put words in Maddow's mouth, advocating for change doesn't mean you need to pretend you've won the argument already.

[Krayt]

*I* have no problem keeping the money you earned. But I am not a political hack running around believing things like government letting you keep a little more of the money you earned yourself is "subsidizing" you.

So let's see loudmouths donate what they really want everyone to pay in increased taxes. Prove government is that valuable to them! Then say it should be rolled out to all. You will get more agreement that way.

Umm, I mean if it isn't just about tired class warfare rage so a handful of politicians can get elected so they and their families and connected cronies can get rich as they sling trillions and block business with unending and rapidly growing regulation.

I mean, it's not about that, right (unlike most countries on Earth and through history, where this is the reason to go into government).

[Sarcastr0]

No, you don't have a problem with it, you just want to yell at liberals.

Living in the world that exists, and not an imaginary world where your preferred policies exist, is actually what most people, politicians or no, do.

Yeah, it's silly if you stop for a moment to examine the demand that like Warren Buffet give away all his money because he doesn't like how low his taxes are. That would be pointless; policies are evaluated and passed as they apply to society at large, not to individuals.

[Don Nico]

Warren Buffet making loud statement about how he paid a lower percent of earnings than his secretary is hypocrisy. He only needs to give is tax accountants different instructions and he can pay much more.

[Nige]

Is the hypocrisy more important than what it illustrates?

[Don Nico]

Yes it is.
Any fool could have made Buffet's observation.
Only Buffet could have paid $1B more in taxes.

[Nige]

Which was his point. Tax the filthy rich!

[Krychek_2]

But that doesn't solve the problem of all the other rich guys who pay a lower amount than their secretaries.

[Kevin Smith]

Lots of rich guys look up to Buffet as a role model. I'd wager if started setting a different example you'd see a lot of other rich guys following suit.

But as usual its all talk and no walk

[Sarcastr0]

Lots of rich guys look up to Buffet as a role model.

Nonsense.

The amount of BS you need to shovel to get where you want to go should tell you maybe you want to go to a mountain of BS.

[Don Nico]

"as usual its all talk and no walk"
That is precisely the point.

[bernard11]

No, Don. It's not hypocrisy.

He was making a statement about national tax policy.

The whole notion that if someone wants to raise taxes they are hypocritical unless they personally make an equivalent contribution to the Treasury is silly. That contribution is not going to make much difference,or accomplish what they believe is a desirable goal.

[Don Nico]

Of course it is bernard.
People like Buffet, has lots of tax avoidance tricks to exploit, some highly questionable.
The matter is one of how close to the edge of the cliff one chooses to walk. He can afford to walk on the edge and he does. In that case I find no reason to hear him as a moral beacon regarding taxes.

[Nige]

The practical lesson is more useful than the moral one.

[Don Nico]

I disagree.

[Nige]

Of course, you're angrier at the guy pointing out the inequality than the inequality itself, which is the right-wing ideological position on all matters of inequality.

[jb]

This is dumb. Ayn Rand used Medicare and Social Security. Does that mean that she didn't really believe that those programs shouldn't exist in the first place?

[BadLib]

Note that she was forced to pay into those programs so it's not hypocritical for her to accept the benefits. If your state requires you to buy liability insurance and you object to that, surely you don't think you should eschew the coverage you're forced to buy and send a "gift" to the insurance company to cover their costs of claims associated with your policy?

To some extent, the benefits of SS retirement benefits track with the level of contribution. Although due to "bend points", the ROI on the "first dollar" put in each year is six times the ROI of the "last dollar" contributed before the cap for someone whose payroll taxable income was "at or above" the cap for 35 years of their work history.

Medicare benefits of course don't scale nearly as much with contributions. Less than ten work "quarters" of creditable work and you pay "full boat" for Part A, less than 40 you pay something for Part A, and more than 40 you pay nothing - regardless of if you require millions of dollars of medical care or virtually none. Also, Part B premiums are higher for those who have higher income 🙁

Perhaps Ayn Rand, if not forced to pay into Social Security and Medicare, would have been able to afford annuities and insurance that would have taken care of her better in her later years.

[Kazinski]

I'm getting social security and Medicare and I wish they had privatized those programs decades ago.

But since they took my money involuntarily for 35 years, you're damn right I'm going to take my benefits. If they had given me a choice in the matter 35 years ago, then it would be a different story.

[Armchair Lawyer]

Perhaps something to worry about on the COVID vaccine front.

Both the head of the FDA's vaccine division and the deputy head have suddenly resigned. Some say in response to pressure from the Biden Administration to approve vaccine boosters.

https://www.pmlive.com/pharma_news/fdas_director_and_deputy_director_of_its_office_of_vaccines_research_and_review_resign_1376106

If you're concerned with "following the science"...this is a major concern.

[Brett Bellmore]

You can follow the science, or you can follow the FDA and CDC. You can't do both, and that's been the case for as long as I've been watching.

[Armchair Lawyer]

I've actually got a great deal of trust in the FDA (CDC is different) to do their job and ensure that a vaccine is safe and effective before approving it. Or I did.

When the heads of the FDA's vaccine department are resigning from pressure from the Biden administration to approve additional vaccines... Then I have issues. Big issues. Because it looks like the politics are overtaking the science.

[Brett Bellmore]

I'm thinking back to when, for instance, the FDA opposed folic acid supplementation to prevent spinal bifida. Went so far as reducing the RDA for folic acid, and suing supplement manufacturers who made such claims.

The actual science was ALL on the side of it working, at the time. The FDA had to be beaten down by the passage of statutes forcing their hands. Afterwards they tried to claim credit for the reduction in spinal bifida that happened after they lost that fight.

Or look at the Pearson v. Shalala cases, where the FDA was prohibiting admittedly truthful claims for supplements, and had to be ordered to desist by the courts.

[Don Nico]

Nonetheless, Brett, these resignations are highly suspicious and are certainly consistent with the Biden administration manipulating the "science" to advance its public health agenda.
Notice that a week ago the CDC published a paper by members of the NY Dept. of Public Health arguing a minimal decline in effectiveness of the mRNA vaccines with time from vaccination and for the Delta variant. That study was in contradiction of a larger, longer, better conducted study in Israel with much more data. The CDC promulgation reeks of politics.

[Brett Bellmore]

Yeah, things may have gotten worse recently. I'm just saying the FDA hasn't been reliable about following the science in many years, if ever. If anything is going on now, it's that they're being pressured to be worse still.

[Alpheus W Drinkwater]

Reading the article you linked, I don't see any evidence that they are resigning because of pressure from the Biden Administration. It seems to be more because of disagreements with specific policies concerning covid boosters, and which agencies are involved in formulating guidance. The article says nothing about approving additional vaccines.

[Moderation4ever]

A recent AP study found that the January 6th Insurrectionists were not treated more harshly than 2020 Summer rioters. This seems obvious to me as a reader of my local newspaper, I have noted that those involved in 2020 summer riots were facing charges, often arranged plea agreements and were sentenced. No one was getting off for the 2020 Summer riots and no one should get off for the January 6th insurrection.

[Armchair Lawyer]

I note you have no link to this supposed study.

Perhaps you can point to one of these 2020 rioters who was shot and killed by the police despite there being no evidence for a lethal threat to the police...

[Sarcastr0]

https://apnews.com/article/records-rebut-claims-jan-6-rioters-55adf4d46aff57b91af2fdd3345dace8?utm_campaign=SocialFlow&utm_source=Twitter&utm_medium=AP_Politics

And your attempt to change the subject is noted.

[Armchair Lawyer]

See, the report is conflating different things.

They're comparing arson (in the Floyd protests) to trespassing (in the January 6th protest), and saying "See, they got similar treatment!"

You need to compare the crimes.

[Sarcastr0]

Haha, yeah if you deny what happened on Jan 06 it sure does look bad!

[Armchair Lawyer]

What happened on January 6th?

1) Protestors entered the Capitol illegally.
2) Protestors peacefully left the Capitol
3) Police shot and killed an unarmed protestor
4) The electoral college vote was certified.

[Jimmy the Dane]

Number 1 is actually disputed with plenty of video evidence that in order to de-escalate some outside barriers were removed and permission was "granted" to enter the building. This might not be true for everyone who entered that day as this did not occur at every entrance, but it looks like it will apply to several cases currently pending.

[Ben_]

Note how leftists cheer the killing of an unarmed protester. And they were (and are) quite disinterested in justice for people killed and injured in the 2020 riots and killed and injured by antifa.

Everyone should be on notice. If you’re a person who is not like them you can’t expect civilized treatment when leftists have authority.

Same thing with when Cuomo got 15000 nursing home residents killed. Not reliable Dem voters so Dems didn’t care. Harass someone they think is like them, gone in two weeks.

[Sarcastr0]

Who do you see cheering it?

Also, read the AP article, and update your talking points.

[David Nieporent]

Yes, that's what he said: if you deny what happened on Jan 06 it sure does look bad.

[Armchair Lawyer]

I'll follow this up with the Babbitt shooting, and some rather interesting implications. We'll use the cop's version of events.

1. The cop was afraid. OK, fair enough.
2. The cop called for her to stop. OK. She didn't follow his lawful order. She may not have heard it, but regardless.
3. The cop (Byrd) "“I could not fully see her hands or what was in the backpack or what the intentions are.”

Oh boy....this is a problem. Byrd admitted he did not see a weapon or an immediate threat from Babbitt beyond her trying to enter through the window.

Usually for lethal force to be justified, you need an immediate threat. IE, a gun, a knife, shots fired, something that justifies the immediate threat. An unarmed protestor is not an immediate threat. Even if you don't know what's in her hands. Yet somehow, no charges.

Really think about this standard. Think about any protest. Protestors approach the cops. They don't listen to lawful orders to back up. The cops are afraid. They don't see the protestors hands fully....they don't see a weapon, but they don't see the hands. The cops are justified in shooting the protestors.

That's the "Babbitt" standard. And it's frightening.

https://thehill.com/opinion/judiciary/569827-justified-shooting-or-fair-game-shooter-of-ashlii-babbitt-makes-shocking

[Sarcastr0]

'an immediate threat from Babbitt' is where your scoping goes wrong.

Considering the mob scene, it doesn't need to be specific to the individual, especially as she was the one smashing through the window in the front of the mob.

That would also hold true for a mob, but not a protest. Your conflation of the two is false, and that's why this precedent is not scary.

[Armchair Lawyer]

So, you think shooting protestors is justified under this standard?

If the police officer doesn't see a lethal weapon, but feels scared, he's free to open fire?

[Sarcastr0]

It was not a protest, so your premise is false.

Though under current law and policy there are decades of examples of officers seeing no weapon and feeling threated and opening fire. Weird you only got concerned just now.

[Armchair Lawyer]

Really? Current case law?

Take this protest in Seattle, where fireworks were being thrown at the officers. Would the officers be justified in opening up with lethal gunfire in your opinion?

https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/crowd-of-protesters-marches-through-downtown-seattle-and-capitol-hill-police-report-arrests-vandalism/

[Sarcastr0]

What was going on in the Capitol on Jan 06 was not a protest. What was going on in Seattle was not a riot, nor an insurrection.

You don't care about the law, you don't care about this precedent, you only care about justifying January 06.

For some reason.

[Armchair Lawyer]

It was a simple protest that got a little out of hand, due to insufficient staffing by the capital police.

In Seattle, rioters tried to burn down a federal courthouse. Repeatedly. Throwing fireworks at cops and burning them.

[Jimmy the Dane]

They still show up most weekends to try to burn down the same courthouse. Just the media doesn't cover it anymore.

[Jimmy the Dane]

Yeah a bunch of tourists armed with cameras and smartphones really tried to overthrow our government on January 6th. Our Republic is so precarious that it only takes a few hundred people milling peaceful around a government building to bring it all down. Does anyone on the left actually believe that?

[Armchair Lawyer]

In addition....the officer claimed to be shooting at Babbitt.

Is your assertion if, you see an immediate threat, but not from a particular person, you're free to shoot the person that isn't the immediate threat?

[Sarcastr0]

Except that as the vanguard of a violent mob, she was a particularized threat.

[Armchair Lawyer]

No.... There was no immediate threat. "Particularized" threats aren't grounds for shooting someone.

[Armchair Lawyer]

Although, the fact that you appear to think that the police are justified in gunning down protestors, if they call them a "mob"....even if there's no immediate threat.

That's a little frightening.

[Sarcastr0]

Yep, you don't know the law.
You don't care about knowing that the law is.
You don't even care about what the law should be.

You just care about instantiating your false facts about Jan 06.

I don't know why I bothered to engage.

[Armchair Lawyer]

You actually think that police can open lethal fire into a "mob" without having an immediate threat? Really? You think that's the law? Really?

That's scary.

[Sarcastr0]

Thanks for putting the words in my mouth, but don't be scared - they're not my words, they are yours.

[Armchair Lawyer]

If you don't think that, you certainly haven't said anything to the contrary.

You've said that shooting Babbitt was justified, because even if she wasn't an immediate threat, she was part of a "mob". That it was justified because she was at the "vanguard" of the "mob".

So, I'll ask again. Do you think this sort of shooting is justified? Do you think police can open lethal fire into a "mob" without having an immediate threat? They don't need to see a gun, a knife, anything...they just need to feel threatened? So they can open fire. Even at people who they admit they do not see as an immediate threat?

[Stephen Lathrop]

Armchair, change the venue. There are only 2 others which are equivalent, the Supreme Court and the White House. Use the White House. Somehow that mob has got inside the White House, and is being kept from the President only by a line of specially trained armed guards, but this time not Capitol Police, but Secret Service. What happens?

The only reasonable question to ask in light of the obvious answer to the question above, is how come dozens of would-be Capitol invaders were not killed the moment they breached the police line outside. That is exactly what would have happened at the White House, and you know it. If it had been the White House, and that had not happened, the questions afterwards would have been about dereliction of duty, and nothing else.

Stop pretending.

[Armchair Lawyer]

Stephen,

"Armchair, change the venue. There are only 2 others which are equivalent, the Supreme Court and the White House."

Sure...let's use the SCOTUS or Capitol

" is how come dozens of would-be Capitol invaders were not killed the moment they breached the police line outside."

So...the 164 people who breached the police line and were arrested, in the Kavinaugh protests. You think they should've been shot and killed?

https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2018/10/06/police-clear-capitol-steps-chanting-protesters-ahead-kavanaugh-vote/1548499002/

[Jimmy the Dane]

Sarcastro is one of the biggest two face politicos around here. He is only fine with the murder of an unarmed mostly peaceful protester because he doesn't like their politics. And that is a real shame.

[BadLib]

So, if a single protester alone throws a bottle at an officer, an officer can't shoot them but if there are 100 protesters who are refusing to disperse and ONE throws a bottle, the police are justified in killing the person throwing the bottle?

[Jimmy the Dane]

Only if they are right of center and white. Then cops can do whatever they want to those people. Beat 'em. Shoot 'em. Illegally arrest 'em. Beat 'em some more. It is all good in the eyes of the left.

Same thing happens to a junkie with a wrap sheet as long as the Empire State Building and it is stop the presses though. Time for looting and riots.

[Nige]

Well you all chose to stay home and whine when people got out on the street to protest police violence and lack of accountability, end even now you're demanding special regard because police used nicer tear gas and softer plastic bullets and foam batons on the Summer protesters. You're demanding things from others you would never in a million years deliver yourself.

[Commenter_XY]

AL....the shooting by Michael Byrd was legally justified. It is not even close. Read this article.

https://legalinsurrection.com/2021/09/law-of-self-defense-analysis-jan-6-shooting-of-ashli-babbitt-was-legally-justified/

That post was not written by some wild-eyed uber-lib.

[M L]

It is close. Particularly by today's standards. A question for the trier of fact. Is it reasonable to think that an unarmed protester presented a deadly threat? When there were two fully armored and armed SWAT guys standing right there letting her in?

[Armchair Lawyer]

No, it's not written by an uber-lib. But it is, very very close, and likely goes over the line.

Here's the issue. Turley gives the example of a cop confronting a suicidal man. The suicidal man is holding a gun, pointed as his own head. The cop feared for his life (The suicidal guy had a gun!) and shot the man. The cop was then given 25 years in prison, despite being cleared by a police review board.

In the January 6th example, there were multiple police officers present. None of them...besides Byrd....had drawn and aimed their guns at the protestors. There was a protestor breaking the glass. Unarmed. No evidence of a weapon, according to Byrd's own testimony. Only Byrd shot. And there are reports that the other police present were surprised.

Now, if we take the testimony of the defendant's position, she didn't even see Byrd. Byrd effectively "ambushed" Babbitt, shooting her without warning. (Nothing is heard on video).

Once we get to the civil trial (although I expect the capitol police to settle) much will come out

[Commenter_XY]

AL....it is a 5-part legal test and only one part of that 5-part test is even remotely questionable. Look, I don't like what happened here. Nobody does. I wish the shooting had never happened. But it did.

The law is the law: Lt. Michael Byrd walks because it was a legally justifiable shooting. Full stop.

[M L]

"it is a 5-part legal test and only one part of that 5-part test is even remotely questionable."

This statement doesn't indicate what you think it does.
You'll excuse us if everyone dismisses your legal analysis/opinion as worthless.

[Armchair Lawyer]

nnocence: No problem. Byrd wasn’t the aggressor

Imminence: This is a problem. The question is, was there an imminent lethal threat. As in…right then. Not 1 minute from then. And the answer is largely no. Babbitt was unarmed. Crawling through a window. Byrd was supported by several police officers, and did not spot a weapon that would cause an imminent lethal threat in her possession.

Proportionality: This is a second problem. The protestors were unarmed for the most part, and there were no lethal weapons (guns, knives) spotted. Could Byrd have been overwhelmed? Potentially. But he had the support of several officers in the area. Unarmed rioters are almost never dealt with, with lethal force. It’s not proportional.

Avoidance: He’s fine here. He’s a cop. He doesn’t have a duty to retreat.

Reasonableness: This is also a problem. And the reason it’s a problem is all the other cops in the room, none of which did anything similar…or even drew their guns. You’ve got to compare Byrd here to other people in the same situation.

If there’s a civil trial, it’s going to be a big problem. You’re going to put every other cop there up on the stand and ask “Did you draw your gun? Did you fire? Why or why not”….and it’s going to be a problem for Byrd, if no other officer in that room had drawn and pointed their gun…but only Byrd did.

[M L]

The civil trial may be a "problem" for Byrd. But isn't he fortunate to be on the "right" side of the corrupt politics, so that he doesn't spend the rest of his life in prison . . .

[Commenter_XY]

As a criminal matter, he walks. A civil suit? Who knows. I'd be surprised if it ever got to a jury, though.

[Armchair Lawyer]

As a criminal matter, well, juries are capricious.

Again, a big part would be the reasonableness of the shooting. You put every other cop there up on the stand and ask "Did you have your fire arm drawn?" "Did you have your firearm pointed at the protestors?" "Why or why not?"

When every other cop there says "no"....reasonableness goes out the door. And cops have gone to jail for less. See below.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Killing_of_Justine_Damond

[Commenter_XY]

AL....The reasonableness test is somewhat subjective; I grant you that. Braca's description of what is reasonable (or not) really helped. But I came out on the other side of the coin: Byrd took reasonable actions given the full context of the situation he found himself at that specific moment in time.

[Ben_]

Cops get away with "I could not see hands" all the time.

Shootings are routinely okayed because a cop says he issued an order, felt afraid, and could not see hands or saw hands move.

It happens about every month in the US.

Any non-police would go on trial for being that reckless most of the time. Police almost never face any consequences.

[Armchair Lawyer]

"Cops get away with “I could not see hands” all the time."

No, they don't. The "magic words" are "I thought I saw a gun." That gives them a lot of leeway. But if they don't think they see a gun...a lot of that goes away.

Here's a list of all the police violence during the Floyd protests. There were two police lethal shootings. One where they were shot at. The second where "they thought they saw a gun".

Everything else was non-lethal.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_police_violence_incidents_during_George_Floyd_protests

[Ben_]

Read news articles for yourself:

https://www.bing.com/search?q=Police+shooting+%22could+not+see+his+hands%22&search=&form=QBLH&sp=-1&pq=police+shooting+%22could+not+see+his+hands%22

[Armchair Lawyer]

And your second link "Charged with murder"

[David Nieporent]

An unarmed protestor is not an immediate threat.

She was not a protestor. She was an attacker.

(How many of the people apologizing for Babbitt think that Darren Wilson should have been convicted for killing unarmed Michael Brown?)

[Armchair Lawyer]

David,

Do you also support the shooting of unarmed protestors who cross police lines and barricades?

She was a protestor. She hasn't "attacked" anyone.

[David Nieporent]

She was an attacker; she wasn't "protesting" anything.

[Toranth]

Which specific individual was she attacking?

[ThePublius]

Divorcing in Massachusetts

After 38 years my wife and I are calling it quits. It's amicable, uncontested, i.e., "Joint Petition for Divorce."

What I would like to know from lawyers and divorcees familiar with Massachusetts divorce, and judges in particular, is how are judges going regarding alimony, and end of alimony?

There was an Alimony Reform Act of 2011 in MA, and a federal alimony change in 2018 such that:

- for marriages over 20 years, alimony is 20 to 28% of the payer's gross income;
- alimony is no longer federally tax deductible for the payer;
- alimony is no longer taxable for the recipient;
- alimony ends when the payer reaches full federal retirement age, 66 1/2 in my case (I'm 64 1/2 now, born in 1957), unless the judge sees fit to extend it.

Where on the range of 20 to 28% are judges coming down?
How are judges ruling about the end of alimony?
What if the recipient of the alimony is anticipating a windfall, i.e., an inheritance from an elderly parent, in the near future?

My lawyer only has said 'it's based on need, and ability to pay.'

Any real-world input on this is extremely appreciated!

[Jimmy the Dane]

I don't know MA as a jurisdiction specifically, but a lot is going to depend on the practices of the local court where you actually filed. Out of all my friends who got divorced in the last decade (probably 8-10, which is actually below the 50% number for my group) only 1 ever ended up in front of a judge or administrative hearing. The local court is going to do is best to keep you out of the courtroom and to reach an amicable settlement with your ex-wife. Whether it is 20 or 28 percent is probably going to largely depend on what the settlement looks like as a whole, if your ex-wife has a viable career, and the initial equitable distribution. These days it is just a big giant ledger and then you move the value and cash around until it gets close to 50/50 (or sometimes 60/40 if there are "reasons").

If MA has a mediation program, look into it, especially if you are still on speaking terms with the ex. Divorce attorneys get expensive quick and really all that you do by litigating it out is deplete the overall marital property that will ultimately be distributed. My one friend who ended up going to a hearing spent so much on a lawyers between him and his ex, they had to sell the house (which was the subject of controversy) in the end to pay the bills. No one wins except the lawyers in cases where the parties decide to fight it out.

[Jimmy the Dane]

As for future "windfalls" if that comes during the initial settlement it can be factored into the need for things like alimony. After the separation date though it would usually not be subjected to equitable distribution because it would not be marital property (and sometimes inheritance is just not marital property anyhow). If years from now the financial situation for your ex changes, then you would have to file for a modification. Those used to be almost impossible to get and the legal costs were prohibitive for most people, but alimony reform has made it more streamlined and courts have less discretion over those petitions in general in most jurisdictions. As long as you check all the boxes of the modification requirements the court has to grant it (again this is in general and will depend on the jurisdiction though and the settlement agreement language).

If you suspect your ex is going to get a windfall in the next few years, but is still looking to bilk you for alimony when she has no financial need for it any longer, make sure to build in proper language into the settlement so the court can revise any alimony award.

[Brett Bellmore]

"After the separation date though it would usually not be subjected to equitable distribution because it would not be marital property"

Yeah, when I built my house, the contractor who put the basement in didn't demand payment for most of a year, because he was going through a divorce, and was deferring income until it was complete. I thought that was a bit dubious, but took the interest free loan, as interest rates were double digit at the time.

[Jimmy the Dane]

An easy tell if someone is thinking about getting divorced at least in the business world is when they ask for deferred compensation, turn down a raise, or take a lateral transfer with a lower salary. Chances are they are getting divorced in the next 12 months and are "getting their house in order" with the benefit of some legal advice.

[Commenter_XY]

ThePublius....I am very sorry about the end of your marriage. All of heaven cries when a marriage ends in divorce. I hope you and your ex-wife get through the process Ok.

[jb]

If it's amicable, can't you just mediate and work this out yourselves rather than worrying what a judge is going to do?

[ThePublius]

It's my understanding that even in cases of mediation, the papers must be filed and there's still a hearing before a judge, as for a joint petition for divorce; and the judge can determine if they think it's fair, etc.

[Bob from Ohio]

My lawyer only has said ‘it’s based on need, and ability to pay.’

Ask him or her these questions and if you do not get answers, find another lawyer.

[Krayt]

"That dude in Brazil" is having mass rallies to try to get the power to suspend the legislature, among other things.

"So this is how Liberty dies, with thunderous applause." -- Senator Padme

Keep this in mind, my fellow Americans. Both sides are engaged in this BS currently.

[Sarcastr0]

Both sides

Do better.

[Jimmy the Dane]

Yeah it is pretty much just liberals.

[Krayt]

Recognize the plank in thine own eye. That is my point.

Having an emergency to warrant emergency powers is bad enough. Then having an "emergency-ier emergency" so you can ignore the first emergency's dictates. And all because of the thunderous applause of The People, and cowardly political hacks seeking to ride it like a surfer, hoping to stay up and not get fired.

[Sarcastr0]

That's facile. Both sides doing something is generally trivially true in politics.

It doesn't mean both sides are equally blameworthy, and it certainly doesn't give you license to wash your hands of the whole thing as having done your cynical duty.

I'm generally not sure if we can map Brazilian politics at the moment onto American political parties.

[MoreCurious]

Two members of Congress snuck into Afghanistan for a few hours last week to see and learn nothing more that they would have seen and learned if they had turned on their televisions at home. They claim, of course, that their presence had no impact on those who were focused on getting as many people out of the country as quickly as possible. The reality is, though, that their publicity stunt diverted resources and attention away from the crisis at the airport. But at least their sophomoric antics prove that stupidity is bipartisan. Does anyone remember the good old days when we could reasonably expect our members of Congress to be at least a little smarter than we are?

[Cal Cetín]

I personally don't remember those days, though to be fair I'm only 300 years old 🙂

I am interested in members of Congress risking their own lives, even if it's at the expense of the public interest. I'm think of the duels, the acceptance of officers' commissions in the Civil War - Sen. Edward Baker (R-OR) actually died in battle - and of course Leo Ryan, whose investigation of Jonestown led to his murder.

Their meddling may not have been a good idea (except for Ryan) but at least they put their money where their mouths were and put their lives on the line.

[Cal Cetín]

Here are some Congressmen (not any Congresswomen) killed in office:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_United_States_Congress_members_killed_or_wounded_in_office#Killed

[grb]

MoreCurious : "But at least their sophomoric antics prove that stupidity is bipartisan"

Well, yeah - obviously.

I will say this : Today's Right seems to celebrate & encourage stupidity more than its mirror opposite counterparts on the Left. There was a flurry of stories last week on Anti-Vax right-wing media figures who died of Covid. I don't want to pick on these figures - they left grieving families - but one particular story filled me with awe.

A hard-core-Right guy in Texas led fights against every single pandemic measure, downplayed the disease and refused vaccination. His wife said after he got sick he refused to see a doctor or seek treatment because he didn't want to add to the Covid statistics. Instead, he dosed-up on horse de-wormer and zinc until the disease forced him into the hospital. He left a widow and three daughters.

Only with today's Right can someone try to "Own the Libs" by refusing to go to a doctor. I don't think you see Stupid run that deep on the other side.

[MoreCurious]

There's a component of this stupidity argument that hasn't been discussed much -- or if it has, I haven't seen it. Who is paying the hospital bills for the stupid anti-vax people who end up on ventilators in the ICU? Perhaps they all have good insurance, but somehow I doubt it.

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

Better Americans have been subsidizing clingers for so long as we have had clingers.

[MoreCurious]

Maybe there should be a law that deputizes private individuals so they can sue uninsured anti-vaxxers (or their estates) who end up in the hospital with Covid. We could incentivize them by offering them at least $10,000 to pay their attorneys' fees.

[Ben_]

Why would anyone believe anything the TV news media reports?

[Aunt Teefah]

How it started: "We'll put a boot in your ass, it's the American way!"
How it ended: "Please Mr. Taliban, please don't do any more terrorism after we leave, ok?"

Hopefully this humiliation will lead to a rethinking of US imperialism writ large, though I'm not holding my breath. But at the very least, it has been fun to see all the war hawks and natsec types thrashing about for the last few weeks. Hopefully more of that to come.

[TwelveInchPianist]

And folks upthread were talking about the right celebrating the Taliban's victory.

[Sarcastr0]

No, the right is celebrating the Taliban full stop.

Above, I dinged Brett for celebrating the Taliban, and I don't like AT here either, but this ain't that.

[Brett Bellmore]

I haven't celebrated the Taliban, Sarcastro. And I explained your category error above. Thinking they're in some ways more competent than our current government/military leadership doesn't mean I approve of them.

It just makes them more dangerous.

[Sarcastr0]

Yeah, that was wrong - you celebrated their victory.

But no, I don't think there is anything competent or admirable in being enough of a nihilistic zealot you're willing to kill people till you get your way.

[Brett Bellmore]

I. Didn't. Celebrate. Squat.

But I know you're not nuanced enough to understand the difference between, "They're good at that" and "They're good".

[Sarcastr0]

I get the clarification, but celebrating the ruthlessness of ruthless theocrats is still dumb.

Yes, if the US acted like imperial psychopaths we could have held Afghanistan forever, and relatively easily.

Fanatical lack of restraint is not impressive.

[Armchair Lawyer]

Gaslightro returns!

[Aunt Teefah]

The Taliban certainly should not be celebrated, but that doesn't mean that a reduction of US imperial power is not a good thing.

[TwelveInchPianist]

You don't get this particular reduction in US imperial power without the Taliban. So you can't celebrate one without celebrating the other.

[Nige]

Which actually sums up US imperialism quite well: there is nothing to celebrate. It's all awful. But some people got richer, which was the real point all along.

[Sarcastr0]

Recognizing but-for cause of something good is not the same as celebrating said cause.

Or else if you like Israel you gotta hand it to Hitler.

[TwelveInchPianist]

"Recognizing but-for cause of something good is not the same as celebrating said cause."

You can't celebrate the fact that the US doesn't have the power to prevent the Taliban takeover without celebrating the Taliban takeover. They're two sides of the same coin.

[Sarcastr0]

Yes you can.

Just like you can celebrate Israel existing without celebrating Hitler.

[TwelveInchPianist]

Can you celebrate the Weimar Republic's lack of ability to prevent the rise of Hitler without celebrating Hitler?

[Sarcastr0]

I can certainly celebrate your mixing up carts and horses.

[TwelveInchPianist]

But can you do it without celebrating Hitler?

[Nige]

That would be putting the cart before the Horst Wessel.

[M L]

I agree with you, Aunt Teefah.

Though, I don't think the Toby Keith-listening hoi polloi ever wanted to try and social engineer, build and occupy people on the other side of the globe. They just wanted to blow up the guys that blew up the towers. In the end, of course, their passions were used for the benefit of the imperialist globalist military industrial complex. As it's always been.

[apedad]

And in news concerning diversity and cultural awareness which will drive righties apeshit, the National Insider Threat Awareness Month (NITAM), theme is “Insider Threat and Cultural Awareness.”

For those not involved with national security, the Insider Threat program is basically just "if you see something, say something" so if you see a co-worker not meeting requirements / standards / personal responsibilities, then you should report them.

Usually Insider Threat reporting includes arrests, alcohol/drug abuse, bankruptcy, not following security requirements (e.g. didn't lock the safe), i.e. negative events.

However, it looks like they want to include avoiding "social missteps and prevent unintentional harm that can lead to increased risk for insider threat."

So we should increase cultural awareness so nobody will feel insecure less they start to commit espionage.

Hmmmmm....ok....m-a-y-b-e this might go a scoche too far.

Message 1: By promoting awareness and understanding of cultural differences within the workforce, you help your organization and individuals avoid social missteps and prevent
unintentional harm that can lead to increased risk for insider threat.
Intended Action: Create a workplace culture that prioritizes collective understanding of different backgrounds and cultures, mutual respect towards one another, and continued education on diversity and inclusivity in the workplace.

Message 2: Individuals and organizations achieve higher cultural competence through cultural awareness to mitigate insider risk.
Intended Action: Incorporate awareness of diverse cultures and subcultures in everyday interactions and into policy writing, outreach efforts, risk mitigation, etc.

Message 3: Creating a positive organizational culture increases engagement and loyalty to leadership and the organization, while reducing the risk of InTs.
Intended Action: Create an effective organizational culture by facilitating trust and understanding both among the workforce and between the workforce and leadership. This will improve employee attitudes and behaviors such as job satisfaction, organizational commitment, sabotage, turnover intention, stress, organizational
citizenship behavior, and job performance which decreases an organization’s vulnerability to InT.

[Don Nico]

"If your mommy is a Commie, then you'd better turn her in."

[M L]

LA Teachers Union: It's ok that kids don't know math. They know the word, insurrection. LOL.

[Jimmy the Dane]

Math is racist so there is no reason for kids to know it. They should just know how to be left wing revolutionaries. That is the only education that matters according to teacher unions.

[TwelveInchPianist]

The other day I posted this video of kids doing math problems under California's new math framework. They don't solve them, they just re-write them to be PC.

The video is linked in Chapter 2 of the new math framework, in case anybody doubts its authenticity.

[Kazinski]

All my kids know math, in fact a lot more than I do, and I spent my career as a computer programmer.

That's how white supremacy works, we let teachers fuck over other people's kids, we take care of business with our own kids

[M L]

NEWSWEEK:

For more than seven months, the U.S. Capitol Police officer who shot and killed Ashli Babbitt, an unarmed protester climbing through a broken window in a hallway of the U.S. Capitol on January 6, has remained anonymous.

Though his name was known to U.S. Capitol Police, congressional staffers and federal investigations, no one would divulge it. The secrecy fueled months of online speculation.

Babbitt's family alleged a coverup.

"The U.S. Congress wants to protect this man. He's got friends in high places and they want to protect him," said Maryland attorney Terry Roberts, who represents the family. "And they've done a pretty good job of it. ... I don't think it's a proud moment for the U.S. Capitol Police or the U.S. Congress."

Roberts told Zenger Wednesday night that the shooter was "Lieutenant Michael Leroy Byrd."

Byrd's attorney, Mark Schamel, did not dispute the positive identification. It adds to information from other sources who told Zenger in recent months that Byrd was the January 6 shooter. None of them would say so on the record.

Byrd is a controversial figure with a record of mishandling firearms, including once leaving a loaded pistol in a Congressional Visitor Center bathroom. Roberts said Byrd's decision to fire his weapon on January 6 indicated his unfitness for duty.

"If I was a congressman, I'd be very concerned about him carrying a gun around me," he said.

[M L]

Typically, police officers who shoot civilians are named publicly. But the January 6 riot and the riots that erupted after George Floyd was killed by a Minneapolis police officer, divided the country along political, class, and racial lines—making officials cautious about revealing the name of a Black police officer who killed a white protester.

Roberts said race was "clearly a factor" in the decision to shield Byrd from public scrutiny.

"It's something that has to be considered, because it's just a clear pattern in the United States," he said. "A white cop kills a Black individual? Their name is out there within a day. It's all public. And look, a police officer is a public official. There should not be any exception for this." . . . .

After not naming Byrd publicly for months, Babbitt's lawyer said he became skeptical when he learned Wednesday that the officer was set to appear with Lester Holt in an NBC News broadcast the following day—and that NBC had already taped the interview.. . . .

Byrd was not justified in killing Babbitt, Roberts said, because he had no reason to believe the unarmed Babbitt posed a threat to himself or others. Byrd fired the only shot at the Capitol on January 6, and Babbitt was the only person there killed by gunfire that day.

Byrd's own lawyer, Mark Schamel, insisted on his client's anonymity since April, loudly, and always citing the officer's physical security. . . .

"Running the name of a hero who has the need for 24-hour protection is disgusting and indefensible," Schamel said July 9 in a text message. He was responding directly to a question that mentioned Byrd by name.

"Is Byrd's decision to grant a public interview an indication that fears for his safety were unfounded?" Zenger asked him during a phone call Wednesday night. . .

"If the violent insurrectionist who died [Babbitt] had survived," Schamel wrote, "she would have been indicted on felony charges and would have been on her way to prison with her fellow insurrectionists."

Most of the hundreds of January 6 protesters who have been formally indicted are charged with trespassing, vandalism or similar minor offenses. Convictions for these offenses seldom draw jail terms.

Byrd shot Babbitt, a decorated U.S. Air Force veteran who served in the Gulf War, while she attempted to climb through a smashed windowpane and illegally enter the Speaker's Lobby, an area adjacent to the House floor. . . .

It appears from footage that Babbitt, wearing a backpack, may not have seen Byrd before a round from his semiautomatic weapon struck her. The coming civil suit may hinge on whether or not Byrd warned Babbitt before he fired. Publicly available videos don't include any audio of Byrd issuing a warning or announcing that he has his gun drawn.

Little is known publicly about Byrd, age 53. The U.S. Department of Justice and Capitol Police have remained tight-lipped about him, even as both agencies issued press releases, short on details, announcing his exoneration.

https://www.newsweek.com/exclusive-police-lieutenant-who-killed-january-6-capitol-rioter-ashli-babbitt-finally-identified-1623166

[Don Nico]

"Running the name of a hero"
The man is no hero. We seem to cheapen the meaning of that word every day. The 13 soldiers killed in Kabul were not heroes, they were targets. Their murder is an outrage and a tragedy, but let's not cheapen the concept of hero.

[M L]

I agree of course. If anything he is guilty of homicide.

I don't think Derek Chauvin intended to kill anyone. Michael Byrd, on the other hand, shot an unarmed protester in the neck. And he did this as she was in the middle of committing a far less serious and threatening act than tens of thousands of BLM riot crimes.

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

Are you whining for Ashli Babbitt or whimpering for yourself?

[M L]

While the situation facing Lt. Byrd was chaotic and frightening, video of the incident shows that Babbitt was merely breaking and entering. She was not presenting an imminent threat to anyone at the moment she was shot. Moreover, in his interview, Byrd admitted that, "I could not fully see her hands or what was in the backpack or what the intentions are."

That gives the lie to Byrd's claim that he was convinced Babbitt posed a lethal threat. Babbitt was the only person who died as a result of the violence on Jan. 6—two other demonstrators died of natural causes and a policeman (who was erroneously reported to have been fatally beaten during the riot) died of natural causes the next day. Though other Capitol police had actually been attacked by the mob, none fired their weapons even in self-defense.

We may understand Byrd's fears and not know exactly what was in his mind at the moment he fired. But if police had applied to the 2020 Black Lives Matter riots the same standard that was applied to Byrd's shooting of Babbitt, then hundreds—if not thousands—of rioters around the country, including those who broke into government buildings, could have been legally gunned down, even if they were unarmed. Does anyone think that such shootings would have been justified by those who now laud Byrd, or that the cops involved would not have been dismissed and put on trial?

https://www.newsweek.com/ashli-babbitt-standard-opinion-1624198

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

Knock, knock.

Who's there?

Not Ashli Babbitt. Not anymore.

[Jimmy the Dane]

That is a really bad joke, even for you AK...

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

Even for me?

I do not want the approval of America's deplorables. I see no reason to appease bigots, superstition gape-jaws, or disaffected clingers. But we -- the liberal-libertarian mainstream -- want and will have your compliance, however you wish to arrange it.

You don't like my jokes? Enjoy Gutfeld! with the other downscale right-wingers.

[Commenter_XY]

Arthur....really?

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

The reality-based world involves accountability. And why not some laughs?

[TwelveInchPianist]

Keep 'em coming, Arthur. Don't let them discourage you.

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

Maybe you guys should ask Prof. Volokh to censor me again. His viewpoint-driven censorship finger is itchin' . . .

[TwelveInchPianist]

I wouldn't do that, Arthur. For the same reason I don't keep my dog in a crate.

[M L]

Japan recommending use of ivermectin against COVID.

[M L]

The war in Afghanistan was a smashing success.

https://ifunny.co/picture/everyone-afghanistan-was-a-tragic-failure-the-military-industrial-complex-IwEsncFt8

[apedad]

General Motors will idle nearly all its assembly plants in North America starting Monday as the COVID-19 pandemic affects production of semiconductor chips overseas.

The industry already has been experiencing a global shortage of the chips, used in a variety of car parts, since early this year. The chips are also used in small electronics and as more workers and children stayed home from work and school last year during the pandemic, demand for personal electronics, such as laptops, rose and created a shortage of chips.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/companies/general-motors-to-temporarily-halt-production-of-nearly-all-us-plants-due-to-pandemic-related-chip-shortage-overseas/ar-AAO1NLt?ocid=msedgntp

[Brett Bellmore]

"as the COVID-19 pandemic affects production of semiconductor chips overseas."

As the response to the Covid-19 pandemic affects production of semiconductor chips overseas. It's not actually making enough people sick to have any significant effect on production, all the adverse effects are due to the response to the virus.

[MonitorsMost]

As unthrilled as I am about the histrionics about SB8 and the Court’s failure to block it, I cannot overlook how stupidly childish the Texas law is. Okay, you successfully crafted a law which evades pre-enforcement review. But someone is going to try and enforce it will get smacked down immediately with all the might that civil rights groups can muster. There is literally no endgame to this legislation. It only serves the purpose of trying to instill panic in your political opponents AND gives them the benefit of campaigning on the back of your doomed retrograde legislation.

Why are politicians so bad at politics?

[Bob from Ohio]

"literally no endgame to this legislation."

Its part of a multi front decades long guerilla offensive against abortion. Its not aimed at being an "endgame".

You are making an assumption about its political effect anyway. So they campaign on it. They've campaigned on abortion before [Wendy Davis] in Texas and still lost.

[Jimmy the Dane]

The number of people that are single issue "pro choice" voters has dwindled in the last 20 years. The left is fixated by the issue and so are its extremist activists, but no one else seems to put it in their top 3. My guess is in a day and age where birth control is readily available, mostly "free" (paid for by taxpayers), and there is no stigma attached to it anymore, people just don't register the issue like they did in the 70's, 80's, and 90's.

But, the pro life vote is still pretty strong, and some numbers indicate it is getting stronger. It largely doesn't matter what kind of "unconstitutional" scheme a pro life legislature rolls out. The goal is to get out the voters, number one, and maybe, if they get lucky, get a case to the Supreme Court that either is a direct attack on Roe or something that limits its application. So far this incrementalist strategy has worked.

If you really want to end abortion though, it is finally time to dump R&D money into a "man pill". If there was a method of birth control men could reliably use with minimal side effects that was transparent to a partner then the number of unwanted pregnancies would drop by about 95%. I'm not going to beat the old stereotype that men don't desire children, but one thing that is almost universal is men do not desire unwanted, unplanned children with casual partners. That is a walking, talking 18 year garnishment of 1/3 of your pay, a liability most men are quite happy to deal without.

[James Pollock]

"The number of people that are single issue 'pro choice' voters has dwindled in the last 20 years. "

Alas, the number of single-issue "the government knows better than you do whether or not your should be having children right now" voters is as big as it ever was.

[James Pollock]

Amusingly, it seems that it is the Republicans who are determined to make it into a federal issue. At present, most abortions are performed in the states where the person who wants to get one already reside. The Republicans in several states are trying to turn it into something you have to cross state lines to obtain, which sounds a lot like "interstate commerce".

[TwelveInchPianist]

This part looks pretty bad:

"(e) Notwithstanding any other law, the following are not a
defense to an action brought under this section:
...
(3) a defendant's reliance on any court decision that
has been overruled on appeal or by a subsequent
court, even if that
court decision had not been overruled when the defendant engaged in
conduct that violates this subchapter;"

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

Looks like more trouble for Trump Election Litigation: Elite Task Force.

First, a lead lawyer for a bunch of Trump's insurrectionists reportedly can not communicate consequent to COVID-19 infection. Apparently a horse dewormer/elephant tranquilizer cocktail hasn't helped him yet.

"Reportedly" must suffice because the "lawyer" who described that condition to a court is not a lawyer -- instead, he appears to be a former right-wing law clerk who lacks a current law license consequent to criminal charges deriving from his courthouse conduct.

Also, a group of Pennsylvania Republican legislators have filed yet another midnight complaint seeking to combat election fraud -- which is hilarious, in part, because most of the plaintiffs voted for the statute they are attempting to invalidate.

Carry on, clingers . . . so far as your betters, the virus, disciplinary authorities, weary judges, and the reality-based world permit . . .

[apedad]

I dunno Rev, maybe we should lighten up on these guys a little bit.

They’re losing religious adherents, losing states, have been losing the culture war for over 100 years, and probably have permanently lost the United States.

And their current leader is Trump - a guy who wouldn’t give any of them a nickel and actually actively takes money from them for his own personal use.

Poor guys.

~~ sniff ~~

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

I'm for stomping them until replacement. Appeasing them is counterproductive and immoral. Mocking them and kicking them around in court are fun.

[TwelveInchPianist]

Stomping on black women who don't want white men to show them their dicks.

Stomping on Afghan women who want to work.

Nice job, guys.

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

I do not consider the black women and Afghan women you have described to be deplorable, bitter clingers? Was there a point intended by your message?

[TwelveInchPianist]

New York Post is reporting that indecent exposure charges have been filed in the Wii Spa case. Given the current state of the law it doesn't seem like it's a crime for a man to identify as a woman and walk into a spa, so we'll see what happens.

[Kazinski]

It's a crime for either gender in California to make an unwanted display of their genitals. And I don't think the fact it was a locker room is a defense, as many men "hanging out" in public restrooms have found out.

Seeing how the guy has two previous conversations for indecent exposure, I somehow think a jury is going to find a for 3rd conviction, and he's going to get some significant jail time.

[TwelveInchPianist]

It's a spa with a jacuzzi and stuff. Everybody's naked.

[Archibald Tuttle]

A legal reform I would like to see is a merger of district attorneys/prosecutors offices with public defenders. Each attorney in the office would be assigned alternately to prosecute or defend.

There is no reasonable balance between the budgets, and the legal advantages given to the prosecution. Prosecutors all insist that they are not out to win at any cost, but interested in justice. I say baloney to that. If they want promotions, they need victories.

The Navy JAG system has worked for a very long time with a merged system.

My attorney says that a merger would create conflicts of interest, but I don't see it. The Navy JAG office does not seem paralyzed by conflicts.

[apedad]

Or maybe do a Title IX sort of thing where the budgets are equal.

As a retired federal agent I’ve seen (and have been part of ) the absolutely overwhelming power prosecutors and the government has.

[Archibald Tuttle]

I'm reminded of the truly tragic case of Aaron Swartz.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aaron_Swartz

[Rev. O.T. Medal]

You can at least partially solve the resource problem without merging the offices of district attorneys and public defenders. In San Francisco, DAs, PDs, and city attorneys are all represented by the same union and thus all have the same pay scale.

[Leaf's Chauffeur]

Interesting point. I did not know that about the JAG. But I can't understand how it does not lead to conflicts, any repeat offender would be such a pain to deal with.

[Toranth]

Wouldn't it become a bit of a problem when the same attorney was on both the prosecution and defense of different cases involving the same police officers?

[dwb68]

Democrats:
>gives 85 billion in US military equipment to Taliban so they can sell women into sex slavery.

>"Upholds" women's rights with a meaningless vote in the House on Roe v Wade.

[James Pollock]

"Democrats:
>gives 85 billion in US military equipment to Taliban so they can sell women into sex slavery."

Somebody's jealous because his number of sex slaves will remain 0.

[c141nav]

Suits in Admiralty Act

The families of the 34 people who died in the Conception dive boat fire off the California coast in 2019 are suing the U.S. Coast Guard for allowing the tour boat to operate despite having faulty electrical and safety systems, the complaint alleges.

The lawsuit, which was filed in federal court for the Central District of California on Wednesday, argues that the Coast Guard is liable for the deaths of the 33 passengers and one crew member because it "failed to perform adequate inspections, allowing Conception to sail with these hazardous and ultimately deadly conditions."