Thursday Open Thread

What's on your mind?

Comments

[not guilty]

Donald Trump is reported to be promising a report that he claims will completely exonerate him regarding charges in Georgia. https://thehill.com/regulation/court-battles/4153153-trump-claims-report-will-result-in-complete-exoneration-in-georgia/

“A Large, Complex, Detailed but Irrefutable REPORT on the Presidential Election Fraud which took place in Georgia is almost complete & will be presented by me at a major News Conference at 11:00 A.M. on Monday of next week in Bedminster, New Jersey,” Trump said.

To paraphrase Ron White, Donald Trump has the right to remain silent, but he doesn’t have the ability.

[BrotherMovesOn]

Have you heard of this Mike Lindell guy?

[not guilty]

Yes, I have heard of Mike Lindell. Why do you ask?

[BrotherMovesOn]

Joking, NG, the grandiose posturing part.
Which evaporates to nothing.

[not guilty]

You likely brought it up for a reason. What does Mike Lindell have to do with my comment?

Donald Trump cannot say anything that will make the charges in Georgia go away, and by commenting he risks giving additional fodder to the prosecution. If he has information exculpating him, it is better saved for trial.

Trump should worry less about the court of public opinion than about the 48 jurors in four jurisdictions who will eventually try him.

[BrotherMovesOn]

"A Large, Complex, Detailed but Irrefutable REPORT on the Presidential Election Fraud which took place in Georgia is almost complete & will be presented by me at a major News Conference at 11:00 A.M. on Monday of next week in Bedminster, New Jersey,” Trump said."

NG, in my mind your post reminded me of Mike Lindell 's Election Crime Summit, or whatever it was called, held on August 15th, which unsurprisingly went off the rails before the first minute of the introduction.
I was equating the two "big announcements" parallels.
I meant nothing beyond that.

[not guilty]

Thank you. Now that you mention it, I can see the parallels between Trump’s folly and Lindell’s farce.

I am one of Trump’s harshest critics on these comment threads. I did not mean to suggest that Trump’s buffoonery would be successful.

To quote Ron White once more, you can’t fix stupid.

[BrotherMovesOn]

+

[grb]

not guilty : “To quote Ron White once more, you can’t fix stupid”

True enough. Trump is dumb as a box of rocks. But even more to the immediate situation, carnival barker hucksterism doesn't fair well against 98 page indictments.

It’s a pretty crude and ineffectual tool in stealing an election too.

[Dr. Ed 2]

Or the 100 MILLION whose maytar he's become.

I don't think there's going to be an election in 14 months. This is worse than 1860 -- SC was not bringing up Lincoln on false charges.

[not guilty]

What is a maytar?

[Martinned]

https://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=maytar

[not guilty]

Thank you for the link.

[Dr. Ed 2]

Cute....

[Magister]

So Dr. Ed 2 is once again eager for civil war. Recall that Trump could get slightly more than 74 million votes in 2020, and then only a few thousand to attack the Capitol in the January 6th insurrection, and that a majority of Americans favor prosecuting Trump for trying to overturn the 2020 election with only 36% supporting Trump. 100 million is clearly not a vaguely realistic number, and even if it were, his army for rebellion would still struggle to reach ten thousand.

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

There are millions fewer old, half-educated, bigoted, obsolete culture war casualties in America than there were during Trump's earlier runs.

They died off in the natural course -- thousands each day -- and were replaced by younger, more inclusive, more diverse, better Americans in our society and in our electorate.

[Frank Drackman]

I know you’ve been “Out of Circulation” for a while Coach, but I’d hardly call our current POTUS President Chucklehead a “Younger, more inclusive, more diverse, better Amurican” And there’s way more diversity on the Repubiclown side of town, 2 Dot Heads (Darling Nikki Haley, Vivisection Rama-Swami, and 1.5 Afro-Amuricans (T. Scott, W. Hurd), and wouldn’t surprise me if Tulsi gets in the pool (love to see Tulsi in the pool, preferably topless) And as much as I like RFK Jr. the DemoKKKrat side is just 2 old Catholic guys. (make it 3 Fish Eaters if Calvin Loathsome gets in)

Frank

[grb]

Dr. Ed 2 : “I don’t think there’s going to be an election in 14 months”

Speaking of martyrs, a true & noble sacrifice would be someone tracking / recording every prediction from Nostradamus Ed. It would be a painful and thankless task, but think of the entertainment value for everyone else!

And if one of his thousands of predictions ever came true thousands of years hence, that could be noted, celebrated, a national holiday declared….

[shawn_dude]

Only 154M people voted for president in 2020. Trump got less than half of them and many of those were likely holding their nose when they voted. Not sure where you get 100M who think Trump is a martyr for them. Trump also lacks the single most important qualification for being a martyr–being dead.

[Frank Drackman]

Problem for the D's is "45"'s gonna be running against Common-Law Harris or Calvin Loathsome, with Robert Kennedy Jr taking a few %, just enough to matter in PA, NH, WI, MI, again, no Assassination predictions, just the natural history of Parkinson's Disease in 80 year olds.

Frank

[Mr. Hook]

And yet, how many of the commentariat here would hail it as proof that he's more innocent than baby Jesus? Better yet, how many here would hail it as proof without even needing to read it?

[Krayt]

The President couldn't get the FBI to look into this irrefutible stuff, got it. No Republican partisans there? No neutral people, career people, who actually pride themselves on following facts for the good of the nation? "Go look into this stuff." "No."

Really?

Nobody will go into details under oath. Got it.

[David Nieporent]

Not only that, but apparently this incontrovertible evidence has been sitting around in Al Capone's Vault for the past 2½ years; even though Trump has been screaming about the STOLLEN election that whole time, he never once mentioned it until now.3

[Ridgeway]

I predict the "new evidence" won't amount to babka! 😉

[loki13]

Again, I will predict stacks of paper.

The biggest, bestest reams of paper that money can buy!

What's on the paper? Pay no attention, but there is a lot of it!

[shawn_dude]

Oh, there will be at least one thing on that paper–a link to a donation page for his PAC turned legal defense fund.

Grifter gonna grift.

[Kleppe]

"how many here would hail it as proof without even needing to read it?"

Presumably the same number who are dismissing it without reading it.

[shawn_dude]

Meant to be a biting quip, no doubt, but that's an interesting perspective. The people who haven't read it and think he's innocent have a sort of religious faith in him. They trust him and that's enough for them. The people who haven't read it and think it's bogus do so, in part, because anything that would prove the election was stolen would have been used in court years ago and we'd have already seen it. They're also being pragmatic given Trump's long and loud history of blatant lies. We've been told the Kraken was coming and didn't even get a plate of calamari out of it. A good amount of the evidence against Trump is already public but he's keeping his evidence of innocence secret until a big, dramatic, public reveal at some point in the future? You know, like when he promised to release his financial statements.

We'll all get to see this supposed evidence when Trump reaches whatever fundraising goal he has attached this most recent campaign and, if it follows the usual pattern, it'll never happen because [insert government bad guy of the moment here] forced him not to.

[santamonica811]

I think the doubters were going on the assumption that Trump is a lying sack of shit. And, like a boy who cried "Wolf!" 30,573 times in a 4-year period, logic dictates that that assume that his announcement was merely Number 30,574.

As we found out today (Friday), they were 100% correct. Trump was lying all along, his lawyers somehow (incredibly!!!) managed to convince him to abort this upcoming trainwreck, and he's therefore canceled this upcoming Monday fiasco. That there was no such evidence came as a surprise to, presumably, absolutely no one.

[Frank Drackman]

Doesn’t matter. Baby Hey-Zeus was innocent, and look what happened to Him. Even His own supporters didn’t show up at His Execution. That Judas Pence doesn’t have to worry about anyone hanging him, if he had any honor he’d do it himself, like the real Judas.

Frank

[loki13]

Attorney to client: We have two rules. The first rule is ... You don't talk about the case. The second rule is ... if you have any questions, see rule 1.

Donald Trump: Okay, I'll only talk if I really wanna.

[SRG2]

I am sure that the report will contain a kraken's worth of irrefutable evidence.

[Moderation4ever]

Just curious has the word "kraken" made it to the urban dictionary yet? "Release the kraken" has to be today's "where's the beef".

[SRG2]

FWIW the stepfather of one of my closest friends originated the line.

[shawn_dude]

This step-father was a screen writer for "Clash of the Titans" released in 1981? Claymation mastery!

[SRG2]

Yup. It's an oddity that he wrote the script for the best adaptation of a Greek myth - "Jason and the Argonauts"* - and the worst. the already-mentioned "Clash of the Titans". Neither the Kraken nor Medusa were Titans, and that fucking clockwork owl...'nuff said.

* Herewith one of the greatest moments in film history - though credit Ray Harryhausen rather than Bev Cross: https://youtu.be/SNg4KZKG96o?t=178

[Martinned]

It looks like I'm not the only one who was getting a distinct Four Seasons total landscaping vibe:

https://twitter.com/jadler1969/status/1692171832860811651

[SRG2]

FYI: https://scontent-lga3-2.xx.fbcdn.net/v/t1.6435-9/124813755_10221034392667515_9085540314803709803_n.jpg?_nc_cat=111&ccb=1-7&_nc_sid=730e14&_nc_ohc=od652CXhMKgAX-K5zcP&_nc_ht=scontent-lga3-2.xx&oh=00_AfDP_HAHdptOAV21KfPdA_AVU0MejhW4E26qFwienjfjLA&oe=65061E7F

[gVOR08]

I'm seeing stories this morning that Trump's lawyers are trying to talk him out of doing his big report on Monday. For reasons that are obvious to anyone not in the cult. Personally I hope his lawyers fail. Keep digging, Donnie.

[David Nieporent]

In the least shocking news ever, it turns out that in fact there will be no such report.

[santamonica811]

A few idle thoughts about the upcoming Trump trials. 1. I think it would be a grave injustice to America if at least some of them are not televised. If Trump is found not guilty, then he should have the right to show this to the American public, and to do this even more publicly than news coverage of his indictments, perp walks, etc.. If he is found guilty, then the American people should be able to see the court proceedings of that. In both cases, to reassure American’s that Trump is getting fair trials. I’d hate for courts to act to deliberately hide from American’s eyes what is happening. Listening to live audio is *something*, of course. But it’s a pale copy . . . being deprived of the chance to observe witnesses’ demeanors, to see the evidence that is being presented by Trump and by the prosecution, etc.

The only argument against is that it could lead to a circus-type process, a la the OJ trial. But, in balancing interests, I think the benefits to showing us the trial far outweigh any potential risks. (Yes, of course, we all understand that–as it presently stands–the existing legal default is that we simply can’t have video cameras inside federal courtrooms. I do recognize that it would take an affirmative act [by SCOTUS? by a different body???] to permit this.)

(An alternate path might be that the trial is videotaped, but the court doesn’t release it until after the trial is over. So, at least, voters who want to, can see as much or as little as they want. And, at least, historians would have a decent record of these landmark proceedings.)

2. I am ecstatic that Eastman has been indicted. And Mark Meadows as well. Eastman is an amoral and evil dude, and I do hope he’s punished for all the harm he’s caused this country. To a lesser extent; I feel the same about Meadows. But I’m surprised to find that I feel no pleasure about Rudy Guiliani. He’s repeatedly lied and been an embarrassment to the legal profession. But I look at him, this shambling, pathetic shell of his former self, and I find myself feeling more pity than hatred. And, God help me; I kinda feel the same way about Trump himself. His best years are behind him, he’s gone past evil into batshit-crazy territory, and I do feel like my anger should be directed at people who are still in their right minds. If he were not running for president, AND if he were one of the ex-presidents who just went away quietly and stayed mostly uninvolved in politics, I’d be hoping for comprehensive plea deals that resulted in no jail time. Given his desire to run the country again, and given his willingness to try and destroy any institution that bothers him, my charitable nature only goes so far.

3. The worst of the worst, IMO, is Roger Stone. I am dismayed that he (like any good cockroach) seems to be avoiding any consequences for his almost endless parade of corrupt and malign acts. Not a single indictment, nor is any on the horizon, as far as I can tell. For Roger Stone, I hope a large piano falls from a building and crushes him. Stone joins Vladimir Putin as the only 2 people on Earth for whom I wish physical harm of this sort. (I’m sure this says far more about me than it says about the repugnant and repulsive Mr. Stone.)

[Kazinski]

Televising the trial won’t happen if, as there is a decent chance, the Georgia charges are removed to Federal court, they don’t allow cameras in the courtroom.

Now I realize Trump tried and failed to do this with the Braggs Stormy Daniels case and the Jean Carroll libel case but there is a lot better argument that dealing with results of a federal election are official matters than payoffs to porn stars or 30 year old rape allegations.

[not guilty]

Of the 19 Georgia defendants, only three (Donald Trump, Mark Meadows and Jeffrey Clark) were (arguably) officers of the United States during part of the relevant time frame. Removal as to one or some defendants does not remove the entire case.

Meadows's notice of removal is here. https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.gand.319225/gov.uscourts.gand.319225.1.0.pdf Federal officer removal under 28 U.S.C. § 1442(a) must be predicated upon averment of a colorable federal defense. Mesa v. California, 489 U.S. 121, 139 (1989).

Meadows's notice falls short in that regard, notwithstanding his cavilling about an immunity defense pursuant to the Supremacy Clause. It is clear that a federal official does not enjoy absolute state immunity simply because of his office and his purpose. Baucom v. Martin, 677 F.2d 1346, 1350 (11th Cir. 1982).

[Kazinski]

Removal to federal court doesn’t depend on any claim of immunity absolute or otherwise, nor does he have to prove his innocence in any degree whatsoever. All Meadows has to do is plausibly state his duties encompassed an interest in determining the validity of the election in Georgia and/or what steps should be taken if there was any chance the election results could be overturned.

As I understand it if his removal claim is successful they would try the case using Georgia law, in Federal court with a federal judge and jury. Then the court will determine if Georgia law conflicts with federal law, and if not try the case as to Meadows (and Trumps) guilt or innocence using Georgia law and the US Constitution.

And I think its very likely it will be removed. If they allow this, what's next States trying FBI officers for perjury or civil rights violations?

[not guilty]

"Removal to federal court doesn’t depend on any claim of immunity absolute or otherwise, nor does he have to prove his innocence in any degree whatsoever. All Meadows has to do is plausibly state his duties encompassed an interest in determining the validity of the election in Georgia and/or what steps should be taken if there was any chance the election results could be overturned."

Wrong. Removal to federal court under 28 U.S.C. § 1442(a)(1) requires that the state prosecution has been brought against "any officer (or any person acting under that officer) of the United States or of any agency thereof, in an official or individual capacity, for or relating to any act under color of such office . . ." Such removal must be predicated upon the accused's averment of a colorable federal defense. Mesa v. California, 489 U.S. 121, 139 (1989).

The only federal defense that Meadows asserts in his notice of removal (pp. 7, 10-12) is a federal immunity defense under the Supremacy Clause of the Federal Constitution. https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.gand.319225/gov.uscourts.gand.319225.1.0.pdf A notice of removal of a criminal prosecution shall include all grounds for such removal. A failure to state grounds that exist at the time of the filing of the notice shall constitute a waiver of such grounds. 28 U.S.C. § 1455(b)(2).

[David Nieporent]

Of course, the real battle is to explain how trying to steal an election for his boss is related to his federal office. (Yes, I know he'll claim they were concerned about election integrity, or some such bullshit, and call that a federal matter. But the presence of Trump's personal attorneys on the Raffensperger call helps belie that. This was about Trump's personal interests, not any federal interest.)

[Life of Brian]

No doubt. I mean, how dare the man pretend to have any sort of colorable perspective on what actually happened that differs from the last couple of years of media-fueled, bloodthirsty armchair quarterbacking!

[David Nieporent]

Did you bother to read what I wrote, or just type something that was boiling in your mind? Of course the man has an interest. But the office doesn't.

[Kazinski]

Right, he has to assert a defense which implicates federal jurisdiction, not prove innocence, not assert any immunity.

[not guilty]

Immunity from prosecution based on the Supremacy Clause is the only federal defense that Meadows asserts in his notice of removal. If that defense is unavailable under the facts and circumstances of the prosecution, the federal court must remand to state court. An evidentiary hearing is set for August 28, 2023.

Supremacy Clause immunity requires the defendant to show both that he was performing "an act which he was authorized to do by the law of the United States" and that, in performing that authorized act,
"he did no more than what was necessary and proper for him to do." In re Neagle, 135 U.S. 1, 75 (1890). To meet the second prong of the Neagle test — that is, whether the federal officer's actions were no more than was "necessary and proper" to carry out his duty -- two conditions must be satisfied: (1) the actor must subjectively believe that his action is justified; and (2) that belief must be objectively reasonable. New York v. Tanella, 374 F.3d 141, 147 (2d Cir. 2004).

This should make for a very interesting evidentiary hearing in Atlanta on August 28. It is difficult to envision how Meadows will establish his subjective belief without personally testifying to his state of mind. To date, Meadows has not been named as a co-conspirator in the events leading up to January 6, 2021, but that matter is still under investigation. I have no doubt that Jack Smith will be paying close attention if Meadows should testify in Atlanta.

[Jason Cavanaugh]

The validity and accuracy of the election in each State are solely determined by the State.

The President's Chief of Staff has no lawful basis in interfering in it, evaluating it, or any other bullshit excuse Meadows has. Even if the State election was improper, it's up to the State to deal with it.

[Bob from Ohio]

"notice falls short in that regard"

The judge disagrees

" For the following reasons, the Court concludes that summary remand under 28 U.S.C. § 1455(b)(4) is not required based on the face of Meadows’s Notice of Removal."

[not guilty]

The evidentiary hearing on remand should be interesting. The burden of justifying removal is on Meadows.

[Krychek_2]

I don’t know if the bid to remove the case to federal court will be successful, but I’m quite certain that the wrangling over it will delay the trial until after the election, which is probably the point.

[not guilty]

There is no reason to delay. The filing of a notice of removal of a criminal prosecution does not prevent the State court in which such prosecution is pending from proceeding further, except that a judgment of conviction shall not be entered unless the prosecution is first remanded. 28 U.S.C. § 1455(b)(3). If the federal court does not summarily remand the action, § 1455(b)(5) mandates a prompt evidentiary hearing on the removal.

[Life of Brian]

It might be helpful to read (b)(5) in its entirety: "If the United States district court determines that removal shall be permitted, it shall so notify the State court in which prosecution is pending, which shall proceed no further."

[Krychek_2]

I am currently handling a mortgage foreclosure in which the pro se defendant filed a notice of removal to federal court after judgment had been entered and after a writ of possession had been moved for, strictly as a delay tactic. Of course her removal is defective on multiple grounds, the most obvious of which is that it didn't happen within 30 days of her being served. Still, we have a hearing next week (in state court) on whether a patently bullshit notice of removal nevertheless means the state court can't issue the writ of possession until the federal court kicks it back. (She also removed it, by the way, from a Florida state court to the federal court for the District of Columbia because she thinks she'll get a better result there; methinks she won't.)

All of which is a roundabout way of saying that if your sole purpose is delay, you do have options, even if only temporary ones.

[Life of Brian]

Yeah, that's... edgy. Good luck next week.

I wouldn't pretend that putting time on the clock isn't part of the calculus -- that's a nearly automatic play as a defendant. But I also think that's far from the only reason a criminal defendant given the opportunity -- particularly a formal federal officer -- would want to proceed in federal court.

[not guilty]

Krychek_2, why did the U. S. District Court not summarily remand to state court?

[Krychek_2]

Because three weeks after she filed it, they still haven’t even ruled on her motion for waiver of the filing fee on the ground that she's indigent. They’re slow.

I have no doubt that as soon as a federal judge looks at it, it will be remanded (and then she’ll appeal that, or at least try to). But who knows how long that will be. In my experience, pro se filings are just not high priority.

[jb]

That doesn't contradict what notguilty said because it only applies once the federal court has decided to remove the case; while the various hearings and determinations are happening in the federal system are happening, though, the state process can continue.

[Life of Brian]

It certainly contradicts the spirit and implication of his argument -- particularly his choice to include the language that the only thing that couldn't proceed was a conviction.

I highly doubt that the receiving judge will sit on the removal notices for long at all, much less anything resembling that sort of time frame -- despite all possible foot-dragging by the state (inevitable and unsurprising as the defendants' efforts in state court, but probably viewed through much rosier glasses by many here).

[not guilty]

"It might be helpful to read (b)(5) in its entirety: 'If the United States district court determines that removal shall be permitted, it shall so notify the State court in which prosecution is pending, which shall proceed no further.'”

My point is that the mere filing of notice of removal does not occasion a delay. And FWIW, a refusal to remand would bring the federal Speedy Trial Act into play -- a statutory scheme that would not apply to state court proceedings.

A prompt evidentiary hearing on the issues of whether the prosecution arises out of conduct relating to any act under color of federal office and whether there is any colorable federal defense would not appreciably delay proceedings.

[Life of Brian]

My point is that the mere filing of notice of removal does not occasion a delay.

That's much clearer (and narrower) than your original post, which as I just noted above went of its way to include the "anything up to conviction" language.

Without the benefit of the portion of (b)(5) you cropped, readers might be misled into thinking the state could continue on its merry way up to and including trial, regardless of the success of the removal.

[not guilty]

Pardon me for commenting in, you know, the actual language of § 1455(b)(3). I like to cite original source materials.

[Life of Brian]

I like to [selectively and misleadingly] cite original source materials [, assuming I did more than quickly and inaccurately skim them in the first instance]."

FTFY, O pompous one.

[Moderation4ever]

While the Georgia case deals with federal elections, there is no official role for the President in the election. He run for office and that is the limit of his role. So, it cannot be argued he was doing anything in an official capacity. The case will remain in Georgia state court.

[David Welker]

santamonica811:

Your impulses are literally unconstitutional as an input into the decision-making process of a prosecutor.

That someone is running for President is NOT a valid reason to exercise prosecutorial discretion either for or against them. Just as really liking or not liking how someone votes is not a valid reason.

The rule of law requires that politicians be treated just like anyone else. That means neither better nor worse. That Trump is running for President is irrelevant. That prosecutors are pushing for trials BEFORE the election (as if this is some sort of emergency) makes these prosecutions feel politically motivated.

In general, there is no reason that it should have taken this long to indict Trump for actions that took place years ago. That prosecutors waited so long and are only scrambling now to bring charges suggests that Trump running for President IS THE REASON they are bringing charges.

I am still thinking through the charges. And I am not a Trump fan, but overall, I lean towards believing that these multiple prosecutions all "coincidentally" timed right before a Presidential election are wrongful. The details of Trump's behavior has been known for years.

Why only prosecute Trump now if not because (1) he is running for President and (2) currently leading all other GOP contenders in the polls???

[Martinned]

That someone is running for President is NOT a valid reason to exercise prosecutorial discretion either for or against them. Just as really liking or not liking how someone votes is not a valid reason.

Sure, but I'm not sure that it necessarily says so in the constitution. If Congress (or the State of Georgia) passed a law that suspended all criminal trials of political candidates for a period before the election, why would that be unconstitutional?

[Nige]

All prosecutions take place before a presidential election. There's always a presidential election at least four year away from any and all prosecutions.

[David Nieporent]

I am still thinking through the charges. And I am not a Trump fan, but overall, I lean towards believing that these multiple prosecutions all “coincidentally” timed right before a Presidential election are wrongful. The details of Trump’s behavior has been known for years.

They are not "right before a Presidential election." The NY indictment was 20 months before a presidential election. The Florida indictment was 17 months before — and it involved events that were taking place in 2022. The last two indictments (GA and DC) I suppose could've happened a bit earlier, but they were not based on facts that have been "known for years." The broad outlines, sure, but the specifics that make it criminal, were not. We didn't know the details of the fake elector scheme which tie everything together. That — along with the roles of all of Trump's co-conspirators — came out through the J6 committee and the various grand jury investigations over the past few years.

The only one that seems politically timed to me, ironically, is the earliest one, the NY one. But not timed to an election; rather, it seems to me like they decided to pursue it, based on an attenuated theory, because Trump hadn't yet been indicted anywhere else and it seemed like he should be held accountable. (Which, yes, but this wasn't the best vehicle for that.)

[Dr. Ed 2]

The Jan 6th trials should be televised.

This is a political show trial and discrediting the system will be effective.

[Don Nico]

"An alternate path might be that the trial is videotaped"
I'd favor that option. Trump is denied an attempt at histrionics

[Commenter_XY]

I don't think it is a good idea to televise or videotape the trial, Don Nico. That could have serious unforeseen repercussions, particularly wrt foreign policy. There is something to the phrase, "don't wash your laundry in public". Our adversaries will see how we treat political disagreements and political opponents, and will be emboldened to act, not inhibited. I specifically have Taiwan in mind.

If the shoe is on the other foot, my feelings remain the same. Example: How I would feel if it was POTUS Biden, for financial crimes (or any violation of law); would I want that trial televised (or videotaped)? And the answer is no.

I only wish there was a face-saving exit ramp for the country.

[Jason Cavanaugh]

"Our adversaries will see how we treat political disagreements and political opponents"

Suspected criminals. Nobody is being charged with crimes because of a 'political disagreement.' Don't be stupid.

[Kleppe]

"Eastman is an amoral and evil dude, and I do hope he’s punished for all the harm he’s caused this country. To a lesser extent; I feel the same about Meadows."

Mark Meadows was indicted for sending a text asking for a phone number. If you truly think this is felony-level conduct nothing else you have to say bears considering.

[David Nieporent]

No, he wasn't. You are stupid, ignorant, and/or lying. Likely all of the above. Meadows was indicted for a violation of Georgia's RICO law as well as solicitation of violation of oath by a public officer. You can tell, because those are the counts of the indictment naming Meadows.

[Kenneth Almquist]

From the indictment: “On or about the 2nd day of January 2021, DONALD JOHN TRUMP and MARK RANDALL MEADOWS committed the felony offense of SOLICITATION OF VIOLATION OF OATH BY PUBLIC OFFICER, in violation of O.C.G.A. §§16-4-7 & 16-10-1, in Fulton County, Georgia, by unlawfully soliciting, requesting, and importuning Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger, a public officer, to engage in conduct constituting the felony offense of Violation of Oath by Public Officer, O.C.G.A. §16-10-1, by unlawfully altering, unlawfully adjusting, and otherwise unlawfully influencing the certified returns for presidential electors for the November 3, 2020, presidential election in Georgia, in willful and intentional violation of the terms of the oath of said person as prescribed by law, with intent that said person engage in said conduct.”

In his notice of removal, Meadows claims that this action was “taken by Mr. Meadows, whether in an individual or official capacity, under color of his role as Chief of Staff to the President of the United States.”

That's a bit more than sending a text asking for a phone number. I'd say that his view that violating Georgia law was one of his duties as Chief of Staff doesn't reflect well on Meadows. To the extent that Trump shared that understanding, it doesn't reflect well on Trump, either.

[Bob from Ohio]

" Stone joins Vladimir Putin as the only 2 people on Earth for whom I wish physical harm of this sort."

Get help. Stone is a harmless clown.

So Stone is worse than the Tree of Life shooter? Parkland shooter? Las Vegas Shooter?

Worse than this guy?

MOBILE, Ala. (WALA/Gray News) – An Alabama man will be spending the rest of his life in prison after a jury convicted him on Thursday of first-degree rape of a baby, along with other charges.

According to the Mobile District Attorney, 26-year-old Cody Ryan Lee Bush was found guilty on all counts, including:
First-degree rape of a child under 7
First-degree sodomy of a child under 7
8 counts of possession of child pornography
5 counts of dissemination of child pornography
Prosecutors said Bush raped an 18-month-old female relative in 2020."

[Frank Drackman]

In Alabama the "Life" sentence includes "Accidently" getting a broom stick stuck up your rectum.

Frank "Rectum? damn near killed him!"

[santamonica811]

I'm thinking of harm to the country. (I assumed that it went without saying that, on an individual basis, there are literally thousands or tens of thousands of horrific acts done by truly dreadful people. The worst of child rapes, or kidnap-murders does not threatened to destroy the fabric of our political system, nor the norms that have guided our country for 2.5 centuries. Those crimes cause unspeakable agony for the victims and people involved. But not society writ large.)

I thought the above was obvious. But I'm glad to have the chance to clarify, just in case others missed my (unspoken) real point.

[Kazinski]

There’s some interesting news released about the House’s investigation of Joe Biden’s finances (it was never really about Hunter):

“In a text thread with his assistant, Katie Dodge, Hunter wrote that his Wells Fargo account “shut me out again.”

“Too many cooks in the kitchen,” he wrote on April 12, 2018. “Too many profile changes and such. Happened 10 days ago too. What do you need? I’m going to bank in a few. Need to verify identity in person.”

“I need to pay AT&T,” Dodge responded.

Hunter Biden then instructed Dodge to put the payment on both his debit card and his “Wells Fargo credit line.”

“My dad has been using most lines on this account which I’ve through the gracious offerings of Eric [Schwerin] have paid for past 11 years,” Hunter wrote.”

https://www.foxnews.com/politics/gop-erupts-2018-text-hunter-biden-claiming-hed-paid-dads-bills-past-11-years

So I’m sure this means nothing like everything else so far means nothing, but now we have information on: – the financial institution, Wells Fargo account and credit lines – whose name the account was in – who was logging on to the account and using it to pay their bills – Joe and Hunter – Who was managing the source of the funds – Hunters business partner Eric Schweren – And the time frame – the 11 years previous to April 2018.

Of course this isn’t a smoking gun, the smoking gun will be when the House subpoenas the bank records from Wells Fargo, and traces the disbursements, and traces the source of the funds.

The development last week with Weiss being appointed Special counsel confirms what the IRS and FBI whistleblowers were claiming all along, that Weiss did not have authority to charge Hunter as he saw fit. Of course its an open question of whether the appointment is just a tactic to keep Weiss from having to testify in front of Congress about what authority he has and when he got it. The other question is will Weiss sit back and let the House do all the investigating, or will he try to salvage his reputation now that he has the authority and dig into Hunters finances as they relate to Joe himself?

I will say I hope Hunter pleads not guilty on the gun charge, goes to trial and beats the rap because the text, history and tradition does not support the removal of gun rights for users of intoxicating substances when they aren’t actually intoxicated, however beating the charge of lying on the form will be a heavier lift. Not that I’m worried about Hunter, we know even if pardoning Hunter is Joes last official act, Hunter won’t see even a day in jail, at least on federal charges.

[not guilty]

Hunnter Biden is a notorious scoundrel who has been trading on his family name. I hold no affection for him.

That having been said, what is the House of Representatives investigating here? SCOTUS opined in Watkins v. United States, 354 U.S. 178 (1957):

The power of the Congress to conduct investigations is inherent in the legislative process. That power is broad. It encompasses inquiries concerning the administration of existing laws, as well as proposed or possibly needed statutes. It includes surveys of defects in our social, economic or political system for the purpose of enabling the Congress to remedy them. It comprehends probes into departments of the Federal Government to expose corruption, inefficiency or waste. But, broad as is this power of inquiry, it is not unlimited. There is no general authority to expose the private affairs of individuals without justification in terms of the functions of the Congress. . . . No inquiry is an end in itself; it must be related to, and in furtherance of, a legitimate task of the Congress. Investigations conducted solely for the personal aggrandizement of the investigators or to "punish" those investigated are indefensible.

Id., at 187.

[Martinned]

Presumably they're considering adopting some serious, effective, anti-corruption legislation?

https://www.transparency.org/en/cpi/2022

[OtisAH]

Hah! Yeah, probably.

Wait, were you serious?

Hey, remember when all of MAGA kept screaming that dems couldn’t even whisper Turnip’s name unless they had a *legitimate* legislative purpose? Or how any legislative purpose expressed didn’t count because MAGA determines what is “legitimate”? Yeah, that was cool.

[Kleppe]

"Or how any legislative purpose expressed didn’t count because MAGA determines what is “legitimate”?"

Turnabout is fair play.

[Kazinski]

There is an obscure clause in Article.1 that the House might try to claim gives them the authority to investigate the President:
"The House of Representatives Speaker ... shall have the sole
Power of Impeachment."

And a preliminary investigation with full powers to subpoena documents, and compel testimony seems well.within the four corners of the Houses power. And lets note that when the texts in question were sent Joe Biden but for most of the 11 year period before that Joe was VP.

[Martinned]

Sure, but what gives them the power to investigate the President's family?

[Kazinski]

The allegation is that Hunter was channeling funds to Joe, and the allegation was made by Hunter:

“My dad has been using most lines on this account which I’ve through the gracious offerings of Eric have paid for past 11 years,”

There isn't any court that would constrain Congress from getting records for an account for which there is any reason to believe its being used to the presidents benefit.

[Martinned]

If that's the allegation they're worried about they should probably spend a little less time talking about Hunter and a little more time talking about the President.

[Kazinski]

Hunter is in no danger of impeachment I assure you.

[Martinned]

Indeed. Hence my question.

[Kazinski]

Whoops that should be:
"The House of Representatives … shall have the sole Power of Impeachment.”

[Sarcastr0]

This isn’t an impeachment it quirky.

[Martinned]

As a general matter, holding hearings to investigate accusations that might lead to impeachment seems fair game. But I wouldn't go so far as to say that that's actually what House Republicans are doing.

[Brett Bellmore]

No more than the Democrats were actually investigating whether they needed to change tax laws, when they demanded Trump's tax returns. They just wanted to leak them.

But, what's sauce for the goose, I suppose.

[Commenter_XY]

That is precisely the case = sauce for the goose

[Nige]

What are the Republicans hoping to leak about Biden? That another whistleblower has contradicted ther public statements?

[Frank Drackman]

I'd like to see his Brain MRI, more Neurofibrillary Tangles than functioning Neurons.

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

more Neurofibrillary Tangles than functioning Neurons

Is that the type of thing that causes random capitalization, rampant misspelling, and other forms of subliteracy?

[not guilty]

Kazinski, do you seriously propose that the House of Representatives should impeach Hunter Biden?

[Michael P]

Are you really as stupid as you act? He specifically quoted one plausible basis to investigate an impeachment of Joe Biden.

[not guilty]

How so, Michael P? I see a lot of blather about Hunter Biden, but nothing suggesting treason, bribery or high crimes or misdemeanors by Joe Biden.

[Frank Drackman]

How about charging Parkinsonian Joe with 12 counts of First Degree Murder for the Dead Marines/Soldiers/Navy Corpse-man at Kabul International? I guarantee you I could find a Grand Jury somewhere who’ll indict him and a Jury that’ll convict him.

[not guilty]

"How about charging Parkinsonian Joe with 12 counts of First Degree Murder for the Dead Marines/Soldiers/Navy Corpse-man at Kabul International? I guarantee you I could find a Grand Jury somewhere who’ll indict him and a Jury that’ll convict him."

Based on what federal statute, pray tell?

[Frank Drackman]

I thought this was a legal blog,
"U.S. Const Art II, Section 4, Clause 6"

Frank

[not guilty]

“U.S. Const Art II, Section 4, Clause 6”

Uh, that does not describe any criminal offense at all. What first degree murder statute do you refer to, Frank? Please be specific.

[Frank Drackman]

"RICO" of course.

[not guilty]

RICO, Frank? What is the enterprise? What did Joe Biden have to do with the enterprise? What are the predicate acts, and who committed them? When and where did such acts occur?

[not guilty]

Still waiting, Michael P.

[Michael P]

You're not only as dumb as you act, you're rude to match.

[not guilty]

If you can't support your facile contentions, man up and say so.

What suggests treason, bribery or high crimes or misdemeanors by Joe Biden?

[Kazinski]

Don’t be obtuse, since Trumps TWO impeachments Joe Biden is indistinguishable from a ham sandwich to the house.

Now if the previous house might possibly have restrained themselves over the first impeachment, maybe Joe (and a couple of slices of rye and Swiss) wouldn’t be as attractive to the House.

But they got their appetite whetted, and they gave some material to work with, whether or not you want to admit it.

[not guilty]

Michael P can't or won't answer, so I will ask Kazinski. What facts suggest treason, bribery or high crimes or misdemeanors by Joe Biden?

[Commenter_XY]

Impeachment is a political, not legal act, correct? Therefore, I would expect the eventual impeachment of POTUS Biden to occur early next year, Q1. There is plenty of time for the steady drip-drip between now and the New Year. More is coming. That is just an observation, not a judgment.

But it (the coming impeachment) absolutely won't be political interference in an election year; just like the legal cases POTUS Trump is dealing with are not political interference; pinky swear. 🙂

[Nige]

They're going to need bigger piles of blank paper.

[grb]

Commenter_XY : “There is plenty of time for the steady drip-drip between now and the New Year. More is coming”

Two Points :

1. We’ve had “steady drip-drip” now for two years. It hasn’t amounted to shit. The only proposed corruption by Joe Biden is a theory so laughingly counterfactual it can’t take a moment of scrutiny. Just recently, the testimony of Devon Archer was supposed to tie everything together. Instead it was a right-wing debacle, with Archer saying the exact opposite of every GOP meme. In the short term, Comer raced onto Fox to tell black-is-white lies about the testimony before the transcript was released. In the medium term, right-wingers claimed their case “proved” because Hunter got biz associates a dinner with daddy. With “drip-drip” like that vacuous spin, Joe sleeps easy at night.

2. “More is coming.” We’ve heard that one for years now.

[Nige]

If 'Russiagate' really was the 'hoax' they have to reflexively claim it was, it would probably have looked a bit like this.

[VinniUSMC]

If you had your eyes open back then, you might've seen it. But Trump! you screeched, as you shut your eyes and plugged your ears.

[Nige]

...and read the Mueller report and the Senate intellgence committee report...

[VinniUSMC]

With your eyes closed? I see where the problem is.

[Nige]

There are audio versions, you know.

[VinniUSMC]

With your ears plugged?

[Nige]

Yes, ears plugged with earphones.

[VinniUSMC]

Wrong place

[Commenter_XY]

grb, as I stated...the steady drip-drip will continue for several more months. Time will tell. People will make judgments for themselves.

Let's see where things are in 5 months; that is an eternity in politics.

[grb]

Commenter_XY,

Since we’re repeating ourselves :

(1) Drip-drip has produced nothing up to now.
(2) Drip-drip will continue to produce nothing without something real to produce.
(3) As a political drag on Biden, meaningless drip-drip may be slightly effective.
(4) But meaningless drip-drip won’t scale up to impeachment.

Even Kevin McCarthy isn’t stupid enough to believe otherwise.

[Magister]

Kevin McCarthy is that weak and craven. A small number of moderate if not sane Republicans who refuse to go along is the more likely obstacle to impeachment, although I don't know who those would be.

[OtisAH]

Impeachment is “political” in the context that it is not conducted under US criminal or civil codes. It is not inherently “political” in the sense that “It’s all politics, man!” Tbf, as you appear to illustrate, the latter context is how MAGA sees the process but it is not suppose to be the process.

[The Margrave of Azilia]

"Hun[]ter Biden is a notorious scoundrel who has been trading on his family name."

Do you seriously believe that Russian propaganda? /sarc

[Kazinski]

Well there is a new development in that out this morning, Comer has sent a letter to the National Archives seeking emails and other documents from Joe's time as VP:

"The Committee seeks unrestricted special access under the PRA to Case Number 2023- 0022-F, entitled “Email Messages To and/or From Vice President Biden and Hunter Biden related to Burisma and Ukraine,” which has been published on NARA’s website.1 These records have been redacted for public release pursuant to the PRA and FOIA. For example, an email bearing the subject “Friday Schedule Card,” is withheld in part under a “P6” and “b(6)” restrictions, denoting personal information regarding the subject under the PRA and FOIA respectively. Attached to this email, and made available on the NARA website, is a document that indicates at 9:00 a.m. on May 27, 2016, Vice President Biden took a call with the president of Ukraine, Petro Poroshenko. It is concerning to the Committee, however, that this document was sent to “Robert L. Peters”—a pseudonym the Committee has identified as then Vice- President Biden. Additionally, the Committee questions why the then-Vice President’s son, Hunter Biden—and only Hunter Biden—was copied on this email to then-Vice President Biden."

Comer is not using impeachment as a justification for the request:

"The Committee seeks to craft legislative solutions aimed at deficiencies it has identified in the current legal framework regarding ethics laws and disclosure of financial interests related to the immediate family members of Vice Presidents and Presidents— deficiencies that may place American national security and interests at risk.

The Committee is concerned that foreign nationals have sought access and influence by engaging in lucrative business relationships with high-profile political figures’ immediate family members, including members of the Biden family. For additional information regarding the Committee’s legislative purpose regarding its investigation of the Biden family’s international business, the Committee would direct you to three bank records memoranda it has released this year."

[Jason Cavanaugh]

Be sure to let everyone know the moment this turns out to be bullshit too.

[Kazinski]

Well as I mentioned above about the Wells Fargo bank records, it’s hardly the whole case.

[SimonP]

Yes, I can manage the press conference: "We got him, folks! Financial records showing that Joe and Hunter mixed their finances!" *waves pile of paid utility bills*

[grb]

You're joking, but we've already seen exactly that. Last year, the NY Post ran with a "scoop" that Hunter paid $2,600 to fix a stone retaining wall on a Biden family property. They also discovered Hunter ponied-up $475 “for shutters.”

This was conclusive proof of Joe's corruption. God alone knows how these people survived the ethical cesspool that was the Trump administration...

[Frank Drackman]

Its more the splitting of $10billlion from MBS.

[Moderation4ever]

Am I wrong or should the Speaker Kevin McCarthy's priorities at this time be to get the budget appropriations work completed. I know that when she was Speaker, Nancy Pelosi, stated that the House could walk and chew gum. I question whether Speaker McCarthy's House can do the same. In the 2024 election is the Republican message going to be "well we did not get the House's work done but we did investigate Hunter Biden". Because I think that message has limited appeal.

By all means, investigate Hunter, but after your assigned work is done, not instead of that work.

[Krayt]

Walk and chew gum

Walk: Turn the investigative power of government against political enemies

Chew gum: Spend incontinently to buy votes and get in the way, and your fortunes go up much faster than your salary.

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

You sound disaffected and angry.

And worthless.

Ready for replacement, even.

[Kleppe]

"Ready for replacement, even."

It would be really nice if Artie would stop repeating white nationalist conspiracy theories. But we all know he won't.

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

The replacement I describe involves old right-wingers dying off in the natural course, taking their stale and ugly thinking to the grave, and being replaced in our electorate by younger, better, more diverse, less bigoted Americans.

You know, the American way!

[Kleppe]

You're not gonna hand-wave this away, Artie. You've been championing white nationalist Great Replacement Theory agitprop for far too long for anyone to believe that.

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

You figure I'm a white nationalist worried about immigration spoiling the purity of the American population, rather than someone who celebrates increased diversity and the diminution of conservatism?

[Dr. Ed 2]

You are wrong.

In light of the attempts to lynch Trump, dealing with the Biden Crime Family is far more important than funding a government which is becoming nonfunctional because of the Biden Crime Family.

[not guilty]

Dr. Ed 2, if in the next life you meet Emmitt Till, I hope he beats the stuffing out of you for trivializing lynching.

[David Nieporent]

I'd think he'd probably first beat the shit out of Dr. Ed for bloviating that Till's murderers were just defending white women from rape.

[bevis the lumberjack]

Quit using the word “lynch”. If they were attempting to lynch Trump, he’d have hung a long time ago. You’re minimizing a bad thing that happened to people (some innocent) long time ago. Of course if you’d been alive then, Mr Just Shoot Them, you’d have been the guy providing the rope.

Trump is getting more due process than you or I would. That’s not lynching.

[SimonP]

I think the question for Republicans will come down to, "Hm, we don't seem to do ourselves any favors when we shut the government down" common-knowledge and "We can use the power of the purse to try to pressure Biden to interfere with the federal charges against Trump and to somehow preempt the NY and Georgia state charges" MTG-syndicate cynicism.

Defund the IRS! Defund the FBI! Defund the government!

[Randal]

The only one of you lot that's honest is hoppy.

The basic problem for the right is that demographics favor the Democrats.

To the extent you guys like democracy, you should be happy with Democratic wins.

But of course, instead, you have to tie yourselves into knots to explain why you're losers.

But hoppy gets it. He realizes that the problem for the right is that the United States lets minorities be citizens and vote.

[Kazinski]

Yes we are doomed because of demographics:

“One of the main reasons President Biden is struggling in polls against former President Trump is his glaring underperformance with a constituency that has long been overwhelmingly Democratic: non-white voters without a college degree.”

“In the New York Times/Siena poll released last week, Biden failed to win majority support from non-white voters who hadn’t graduated from college.

His lead over Trump with this once-heavily Democratic constituency is just 16 points (49%–33%). In 2020, Biden dominated Trump with these voters, winning by an overwhelming 48-point margin, according to an analysis by the Democratic data firm Catalist.”https://www.axios.com/2023/08/06/biden-trump-nonwhite-working-class-voters-2024

I muted Hoppy almost as soon as he showed up, so I can't really comment much on what he says.

But I can say a Democratic program of lowering living standards, making it impossible to own ICE cars, making air conditioning too expensive to use, mandating heat pumps in climates where they don't work, inflating grocery prices while chipping away at real wages, forcing pride month down everyone's throats, will make most working class minorities rethink their allegiance to democrats.

And that's what the polls are showing.

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

forcing pride month down everyone’s throats

Your bigotry is what dooms your preferences in modern America.

America's reaction to your bigotry is likely what caused you to choose an antisocial, disaffected life in a hermit's shack a few miles from the precise middle of nowhere, muttering bitterly about modern America and all of this damned progress.

And thank you for that -- better Americans like it when obsolete misfits distance themselves from mainstream society.

[AmosArch]

Conservatism or more accurately the understandings about reality associated with conservatism since the name ‘conservatism’ is a piss poor way to look at it aren’t going anywhere.

The grand western libturd experiment has been a spectacular failure, proven by among other things by the very events you think are good for your side. There is as much race, sex, etc division as ever before. People are as zealous about their religion now called ideology as ever. There is no multiculturalism. Rather western culture fights others as much as ever (now in the name of installing sjw values) devouring and destroying as much as ever. Every fundamental impulse you claim to oppose is as common and as powerful as its ever been. Often championed most of all by your hand.

This, is as it always was and as it should be and as it always will be. You haven’t won any victory, (unless all you cared about was guilty yt libs taking their well deserved self inflicted slide into irrelevancy). And you never will.

Sorry to rain on your parade.

[grb]

AmosArch : “There is as much race, sex, etc division as ever before”

When somebody says something so counterfactual and stupid, you know ideology warps their mind. Presumably AA includes the 50s here, back when Jim Crow reigned supreme, women were viewed with genial contempt as second-class humans, and Jews were locked-out of major parts of society. But most white people were happy and unconcerned over these facts, so it doesn’t count as “division” in AmosArch’s mind.

In fact, there is much less race, sex, etc division than ever before. By every possible measure. If AA finds this fact messy or unsettling, that’s his (very big) problem.

[AmosArch]

You’re conflating group consciousness with overt mistreatment. (which btw I wouldn’t automatically assume is gone forever just because of a short lull in some countries). Go to r/twoxchromosomes, or a typical blm, or azlan meeting, or increasingly just wander around college campuses and you’ll find people far more obsessed with sex or race on a daily basis than someone in the 1700s. Supported enthusiastically by you guys.

The exact groups may shift but they will remain around and as strong as ever. If this was your goal mission accomplished. If not…well what exactly were you progs fighting for anyway?

[grb]

To belabor the obvious, you restrict this “group consciousness” concern to a very limited group of the populace (i.e. the only group you care about)

See, Amos, a black individual in the 50s was probably “obsessed” by the fact he was treated like shit. A woman was probably “obsessed” by the fact society treated her like a joke. Just because that obsession was of no consequence to you (or your recent ancestors) doesn’t mean it didn’t exist.

[AmosArch]

I'm not sure what you're trying to say about black people. Nobody ever likes when they're being mistreated. But I doubt this hypothetical average black person would write poems all day about the glory of blackness and afrocentrism like some do now.

As for women are you referring to their supposed desire to get a 'real' profession and live their 'own' life. that is held up as the modern ideal? Not much evidence of that anywhere but in the fairly recent past. Sure there are some isolated examples of what might be considered 'gender activism' if you squint at it crosseyed but overall the evidence points to women being no less content than they are now (which apparently is very discontent if you do even a cursory reading online) and moreover they are often even champions of the status quo in general more than men.

If women were truly unhappy with their lot there would be no way anyone could stop them from being heard as anyone who is married to one could tell you. But the vast vast vast majority of the sweep of history is completely devoid of even a hint of these concerns feminists claim ancient women had.

In short there is very little evidence of any significant decline in race or sex consciousness and quite a bit of evidence against it.

[Nige]

'If women were truly unhappy with their lot there would be no way anyone could stop them from being heard'

Presumably that's why there were so many actual laws in place to keep them disempowered.

[AmosArch]

what laws would those be? What sex specific laws are there that are that still exist and are actively enforced in America and disadvantage women? Are you referring to abortion? Damn maybe you’re right. No free unlimited birth control pills no matter where you are in the country (unless you get them in one of the countless ways other than an official state mandated handout) and no free taxpayer funded abortion every 10 meters. Spartacus would run screaming back to the salt mines if he could see these wretched conditions.

[Nige]

You seem to think that centuries of oppressive practices can have no lingering social or cultural effects mere decades after the overt legal restrictions have been abolished.

[Brett Bellmore]

Back to inevitable demographic victory. Tomorrow you'll be denying policies of admitting all of those illegal immigrants BY the people touting inevitable demographic victory isn't about making the demographics inevitable...

But, even as the percentage of ethnic minorities is being pumped up in America, the percentage of them voting Democratic has been declining. It's by no means guaranteed that reducing whites to a mere plurality of the country will result in a Democratic one party state.

[Sarcastr0]

Do you even know what inevitable means?

You twice undermine the great replacement white supreme conspiracy theory - that it’s inevitable already and that it’s not working well.

And yet, you continue to claim that’s the real Dem motive.

Seems like you have reasons other than evidence that you like the threat replacement.

[Brett Bellmore]

I'm not the one who coined the phrase...

[Sarcastr0]

Yeah but you agree with it, as well as 2 other things, all mutually exclusive.

[Brett Bellmore]

Where did you get the idea that I agreed that "inevitable demographic transition" was actually inevitable? On the contrary, I think that if we enforced our immigration laws, we could stop the forced changes to American demographics in their tracks.

[bevis the lumberjack]

He read your thoughts. It’s his specialty.

[Sarcastr0]

He wrote the first 2 mutually exclusive down above – that demographic change is inevitable, and also already being degraded. The third, that it is a Democratic plot via immigration and birder policy, is from his previous comments.

It seems he resolves those two by deciding Dems are wrong about the inevitability part. Which makes one wonder why he is so concerned and angry about it.

The mind reading is from Brett, hearing folks talk about demographic change and jumping to that being the unstated main Democratic motive behind immigration policies. Which says more about Brett’s motives than any secret Dem agenda.

[Brett Bellmore]

I did NOT write that demographic change is inevitable. I sarcastically used the phrase that left-wingers have used in discussing why they think they're eventually going to have it all.

[Sarcastr0]

Read the second 2 paragraphs of my post.

[Kazinski]

We are countering the great replacement of white supremacists by turning asians , hispanics, and conservative blacks, gays and TERFs into a rainbow coalition of white adjacent supremacy.

[Nige]

It's always been a fundamental error to assume that only straight white people can be right-wing extremists - it's just that straight white right-wing extremists have been making it, too, so the outreach has always been self-sabotaging.

[Frank Drackman]

Nige-bot dreams of screwing Electric Robot Sheep.

[apedad]

But aren't the white, male, AngloSaxonish guys becoming the minority now?

So then (according to hoppy), they shouldn't be allowed to vote.

Those poor white, male, AngloSaxonish guys.....

(tear rolls down my cheek)

[Dr. Ed 2]

Be careful what you ask for...

[apedad]

I am a white male but am neither poor nor AngloSaxonish.

[Frank Drackman]

who gives a fuck?

[Brett Bellmore]

Plurality, Apedad, not minority.

We're projected to become plurality white in 2045, but that's rather contingent on not counting as "white" a lot of Hispanics who think they're "white".

[Martinned]

Are Italian-Americans white? Irish? Greeks?

[Don Nico]

Martin,
My daughter says that I and her brother are "people of color" but she and her mom are not.

This "of color" is a bullshit phrase used for as a political weapon

[Nelson]

"My daughter says that I and her brother are “people of color” but she and her mom are not."

Are the two of you the biological parents of both kids? If so, how would that work?

[apedad]

I'll defer to Prof. Bernstein on the Hispanic/white issue.

[Don Nico]

They not only think that they are white, they are white by any rational definition.

[Mr. Bumble]

...but at least in the case of Italians (especially southern Italians) they weren't always.

[Bob from Ohio]

A myth.

[Mr. Bumble]

Not a myth:
https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2019/10/12/opinion/columbus-day-italian-american-racism.html
"Darker skinned southern Italians endured the penalties of blackness on both sides of the Atlantic. In Italy, Northerners had long held that Southerners — particularly Sicilians — were an “uncivilized” and racially inferior people, too obviously African to be part of Europe.

Racist dogma about Southern Italians found fertile soil in the United States. As the historian Jennifer Guglielmo writes, the newcomers encountered waves of books, magazines and newspapers that “bombarded Americans with images of Italians as racially suspect.” They were sometimes shut out of schools, movie houses and labor unions, or consigned to church pews set aside for black people. They were described in the press as “swarthy,” “kinky haired” members of a criminal race and derided in the streets with epithets like “dago,” “guinea” — a term of derision applied to enslaved Africans and their descendants — and more familiarly racist insults like “white nigger” and “nigger wop.”"

[Life of Brian]

The basic problem for the right is that demographics favor the Democrats.

The basic problem with this sentence -- assuming that demographic groups should do, and will continue to vote in mindless lockstep -- is that it's even more cynically racist than just about anything Hoppy has ever said.

[Sarcastr0]

He didn’t mention race; that’s on you. And until he talks about retarded IQ blacks he will never equal hoppy, don’t be silly.

But I agree with your larger point that demographics is not destiny, and the GOP has a challenge but hardly one that is intractable given the vagaries of time and politics.

[M L]

"He didn’t mention race"

Hurr durr . . . how learn read? *crosseyed.gif*

[Life of Brian]

Well, it's always nice when we agree, notwithstanding whatever silly throat clearing you need to throw in to take the edge off.

I guess we can wait to hear from Randal about what non-race-based "demographic trends" he (and the rest of Team Blue who constantly ride this meme) may have been talking about. It'll be a tight pivot indeed since he explicitly invoked minorities in his original chum post, but fingers crossed he'll come through for you.

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

Can we all agree that having millions of racist, misogynistic, superstitious, xenophobic, gullible, disaffected, Islamophobic, antisemitic, gay-bashing old conservatives die off in the natural course and be replaced by better people (immigrants, younger people) is good for America?

[Life of Brian]

I'll sincerely be sad when you're gone, Artie. The void in the comic relief on this site -- however unintended -- will be hard to fill.

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

Some of you guys are laughing all the way to replacement.

[Sarcastr0]

Age, generational immigration status, sexual orientation…plenty of ways to cut other than race that have partisan valence.

[Life of Brian]

I guess only one of us was willing to wait for Randal to speak for himself. LOL

Also, you might consider constraining your future coaching to areas that might actually move the needle far enough -- and, more importantly - in the right direction. Most everyone but the two of you will benefit from keeping the distractive chaff to a minimum.

[Kazinski]

Me!!! Me!!!

I was talking about race.

Blacks, Hispanics, and Asians don’t hate conservative Whites as much as you wish they did.

And if they do hate conservative whites, it’s turning out they hate sanctimonious soy boys just as much.

[Sarcastr0]

I don’t think minorities hate conservative whites, where do you get that idea?

I also think soy boy went out as an insult some years ago.

[M L]

Yes, we all know you have a strategy of maximizing legal and illegal immigration to replace Americans and dilute their votes with newcomers that you think will improve your electoral chances.

No, opposing that doesn't remotely require not letting "minorities" be citizens or vote, or whatever else looms in the wild leftist imagination.

Who is a minority anyway? Aren't "whites" going to be a minority soon (and what are "whites" anyway?) When they are will they have white student associations, white entertainment television, etc?

[OtisAH]

Try Violating Basic Constitutional Principles in a Small Town…

This was all over two stories that came to the paper that the paper had not published. And there’s nothing so far to indicate the paper had any intent to publish due to attribution problems. But the fun part, of course, is if the raid and confiscations never happen, the entire nation remains unaware a local Marion, KS, restaurateur is a drunk who’s been driving around town with no license for years and is ineligible for her liquor license. And that the new chief of police has disturbing allegations in his past.

https://abcnews.go.com/US/marion-county-return-evidence-seized-raid-newspaper/story?id=102317793

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

It seems odd that Prof. Volokh never mentioned that development -- too busy combing the white grievance, Black crime, drag queen, racial slur, transgender, Muslim, lesbian beat --- until one recognizes the aims and tactics of this white, male, disaffected, right-wing blog.

[OtisAH]

Tbf, what could the contributors to the premier constitutional law blog possibly have to say about police raiding and clearing out a local newspaper office based on little to no evidence and a warrant of dubious legality?

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

I am always interested in a good constitutional law blog. Could you provide a link to the one you have in mind?

Thank you.

[Brett Bellmore]

‘Anger and radicalization’: rising number of Americans say political violence is justified

I find it interesting that they lead with Republican support for violence to put Trump back in office. (6.9%, I wonder where these people are, I'm not meeting them.)

"The number of Americans who believe the use of force is justified to restore Trump to the White House increased by roughly 6 million in the last few months to an estimated 18 million people, according to the survey conducted by the university in late June and shared exclusively with the Guardian.

Of those 18 million people, 68% believe that the 2020 election was stolen from Trump and 62% believe the prosecutions of Trump are intended to hurt his chances in 2024. An estimated 7% of Americans now believe violence could be necessary to restore Trump to the presidency, up from 4.5%, or 12 million people, in April."

But it's actually worse among Democrats!

"Democrats, however, expressed support for political violence for a different purpose. The survey found support for the use of force to coerce members of Congress to “do the right thing” grew from 9% in January to 17% – an estimated 44 million Americans – at the end of June, with the sharpest rise among Democrats. Support for violence to restore the federal right to an abortion also increased during this time"

"Protect the voting rights of Black Americans and other minorities:
18.6%
Ensure members of Congress and other government officials do the right thing:
17.3%
Restore the federal right to abortion
12.3%
Prevent Donald Trump from becoming president
11.6%
Prevent the teaching of CRT in schools
9.3%
Preserve the rights of whites
8.5%
Prevent prosecution of Trump
7%"

It's a primarily Republican problem, somehow, when the Democratic support for violence to ensure Trump DOESN'T get reelected is almost twice that for ensuring he does. How's that work?

Well, here's where they were getting the data. Couldn't find much in the way of cross tabs. But it's interesting how the numbers make the Democrats look worse, but the words make the Republicans look worse... They're sure not going where the data leads...

[Sarcastr0]

I think there is a distinction to be made from reactive to active.

Only a few of those require violence right now. And that’s Trump, abortion, CRT, and maybe the prosecution one,

You also missed the 12% QAnon. You should include all the results, lest you seem a tool.

[Brett Bellmore]

Yeah, I knew you'd excuse it, somehow. The fact that the violent Republicans think they're being reactive, too, somehow escaped your attention?

I'm not sure why I have to quote the ENTIRE article to avoid 'seeming a tool'; That wouldn't even be fair use! I quoted the part I found interesting: Support for political violence, and the disconnect between the numbers given and the language they used describing them.

For the rest, I gave a link, it's not like I'm hiding anything.

[Sarcastr0]

Abortion is on the list of active issues. I’m not excusing anything.

You seem too knee jerk to read. And too into potential future violence to worry much about the current actual threats of violence all over the Trump trials. And this blog.

[Brett Bellmore]

I'm not even clear on what you mean by "active" vs "reactive", but "reactive" sure does sound like making excuses.

And with Jane's Revenge so active, that seems to me to be a current actual threat of violence.

[Sarcastr0]

A current change to the status quo allowing violence means it’s nut cutting time, or else you need to start making excuses to yourself.

Some future thing making violence on the table is easier to say. Cheaper talk since it implies no current action.

[Frank Drackman]

How many dead black babies is "enough"??

[Nige]

'Yeah, I knew you’d excuse it, somehow.'

The 2nd amendment means nothing, after all.

'The fact that the violent Republicans think they’re being reactive, too,'

Yes, they're reacting to losing an election, their lying criminal ex-president facing charges, trans people existing and people being 'woke,' like Jesus.

[Sarcastr0]

And don’t you say never believe opinion polls?

Meanwhile someone is in trouble for threatening one of the judges in the Trump indictment cases. And the GA grand jury info looks to have been leaked.

Left isn’t full of high minded pacifists, but lots of actual shit going down and it’s all the right at the moment.

[Brett Bellmore]

AGAIN, I found it interesting that the numbers said one thing, and the words chosen to describe them were saying the opposite. Do the numbers actually have to be highly reliable to make that interesting?

And, yes, the fact that response rates for polls are down in the single digits does kind of undermine the theoretical basis for the math used to assign error ranges. You might hope like hell that willingness to respond isn't correlated with a particular opinion, but what basis do you have for that hope?

[Sarcastr0]

So is your post that you are unhappy about the Guardian’s writing choice or the actual substance of the story?

[Brett Bellmore]

I found the Guardian's writing choice interesting, in that it betrays their political bias: Confront them with numbers that actually say Democrats are worse on some metric, and they'll talk as though the Republicans were worse.

But credit where credit is due, they did give the numbers, which a lot of American outlets would NOT have done. One of the reasons I read them: Biased, but they're still practicing journalism as it used to be understood.

[Sarcastr0]

Could there be other reasons for their choice? I can think of a few.

[Brett Bellmore]

Give me one GOOD reason for delivering numbers that say nearly twice as many Democrats as Republicans favor violence as a way to decide the presidential election, and then writing the story as though the problem was Republican support for violence.

[Nige]

'How’s that work?'

He tried to throw out their votes, overturn an election they won, using fraud, conspiracy and a campaign of relentless lies, and a mob of his supporters attacked the Capitol. Republicans keep trying to make voting more difficult and aren't shy about doing so in a racist way. Why would a 2nd amendment fanatic disapprove of people willing to fight tyranny to preserve democracy, especially in the face of people who threaten civil war, not just to protect Trump, but because a trans person drank some beer and a movie got made about a doll? Who bombarded election workers with threats because Trump spread a Big Lie about them?

[Absaroka]

I saw a link to the Guardian article. Neither it, not the linker, gave a link to the original source, which always makes me raise an eyebrow. I went looking, and I think it might be this (or anyway, that's a recent pub from the same people referenced).

And I'm not sure 'the dems are getting violent' is a good takeaway, e.g. "Support for political violence against members of Congress and on government officials grew from 9% (equivalent of 23 million adults) n January 2023 to 12.5% or (the equivalent of 32 million adults) in April 2023 and continues to come almost equally from the Right and Left.The 32 million breaks down as 10 million Republicans, 8 million Democrats, and 5 million Independents."

It's a depressing report, but I'm not sure I see a partisan angle. More to the point, a pox on the hyper-partisans who are so overwrought they think violence is the answer, and any like minded people who tolerate them, be they D, R, or I.

[Absaroka]

Or maybe this is the source, it's a couple months more recent. See chart on p 13.

Either way, folks need to chill.

[Brett Bellmore]

Contrast the chart on the bottom of page 20, "(The use of force is justified to restore Donald Trump to the presidency) with the chart on the bottom of page 22. "(The use of force is justified to prevent Donald Trump from becoming President.)"

9% of Democrats are strongly in favor of anti-Trump violence, 16.1% at least somewhat in favor. While only 3.9% of Republicans are strongly in favor of pro-Trump violence, 9.5% at least somewhat in favor.

I think it's pretty notable that Democratic support for a violent resolution of the Presidential election is running about twice as high as Republican support.

But there are, happily, points of agreement. Pg 20, nearly identical percentages of Democrats and Republicans agree that elites have taken control of all the levers of power and rendered elections futile.

[Brett Bellmore]

"Well, here's where they were getting the data."

[JasonT20]

The political news and commentary media are falling into the same traps that they always have when it comes to Trump. They are expending so much time and space and putting so much prominence on the 'latest developments' that I would guess that few Republican voters are hearing much of anything from the other candidates for the nomination. If only we didn't have a culture where news = entertainment, people might actually be able to make informed voting decisions.

[Martinned]

Mike Pence just announced that he's going to introduce actual federalism. Which would be a great idea if a) there was any chance of him getting elected, and b) the President was in charge of making laws.

https://mikepence2024.com/the-pence-plan/protecting-and-expanding-federalism/

[John F. Carr]

The president can control how intrusive federal regulations are. I have read Federal Register notices claiming that a particular rule does not preempt state law and so does not require review under such-and-such an executive order. Except the rule sets conditions on federal aid. Accepting aid tied to the rule obliges obedience to the rule notwithstanding state law.

[Martinned]

So how does that allow him to eliminate the Department of Education? (To start right at the top.)

I repeat, given the divisions in the US, I think a big dose of Federalism would be exactly what the doctor ordered. But it's not something a President can deliver, and US political parties don't run on coherent platforms. (Even if, for some mysterious reason, they do write them.)

[Don Nico]

He can submit a zero budget and watch the huge fight in Congress which will compromise on cutting the present budget in half. The worst rats leaving a seemingly sinking ship. The next year, the same ploy. More rats leave. And that is the way it goes.

[Kazinski]

Just like in 2016 they want Trump.to get all the oxygen because they think he will be the easiest candidate to beat.

If they are right, great strategy, if they are wrong, back to lawfare.

[Martinned]

That's a fascinating insight in the mind of, say, Rupert Murdoch.

[Brett Bellmore]

All you needed to understand Rupert Murdoch was, "Republicans' money spends just the same as anybody else's." He saw an unserved market, and liked money enough to serve it.

[Martinned]

Sort of. He really likes it when he can call the White House (or 10 Downing Street) and have the President answer the phone. That's not something Succession made up.

The notion that someone like Murdoch is secretly trying to help the Democrats win is for the birds.

[Brett Bellmore]

Yeah. His kids, on the other hand? I think they've grown up wealthy, so they don't value money as much as dad did. So Fox is in the process of transitioning into being a regular MSM outlet.

[jb]

Have you ever wondered if rather than Fox becoming more mainstream, maybe your own beliefs are becoming more and more out there?

[Kazinski]

It would be difficult for me to tell, I don't watch TV.

[Frank Drackman]

But you are aware there is this invention called television, and on this invention they show shows? And howcome the people who say they "Don't watch TV" have TV sets to not watch on?

Frank

[Kazinski]

Frank, I am living off the grid. The TV is in storage, because there is no signal, no cable, and no outlet to plug it into. The closest power line is at least 3 miles away, the closest traffic light is 15 miles away, and the entire county which is larger than Delaware, has only 3 tragic lights.

Now I do have a winter home which I just bought 6 months ago, but I don't have cable. And before I bought my winter home traveled internationally 5-6 months of the year, mostly in Asia, so not much opportunity to watch TV then either.

[Martinned]

So far it is Roman who is inheriting Fox...

[Nige]

'because they think he will be the easiest candidate to beat.'

Have you seen the primary polls? How are the so-called liberal MSM that are utterly loathed and reviled by Trump supporters responsible for his supporters still supporting him? Why is there always this care to displace responsibility for Trump voters voting for Trump onto things like the MSM or the DNC which holds no influence over them?

[Kazinski]

Primary polls don't matter in the general election.

And that certainly was their strategy in 2016.

[Nige]

So everyone keeps saying. The DNC have an amazing amount of power over the RNC, it turns out.

[Kazinski]

You did mention the MSM, and Trump was on CNN and MSNBC almost non-stop during the Republican primaries.

[Frank Drackman]

I know you don’t have a TV but he’s on non-stop now. Once in a while for fun, I’ll switch on PMS-NBC (what did they do with Hallie Jackson? she can indict me any day) and just count how many times they say “Trump” in 5 minutes (about as long as anyone should watch PMS-NBC, Waterboarding would be less painful) it’s usually 10-20 or a “Trump” every 15 seconds for shit’s and giggles, see how long it takes them to say “Biden” they’ll go hours without mentioning the Pediophile in Chief.

Frank

[Nige]

But they voted for him despite this.

(The flip side of your theory has always been that they thought by exposing his abhorrent personality and views voters would be completely put off. More likely he was just already an established media figure, said stupid or outrageous things all the time and had a knack for making himself the centre of attention. Whether any lessons have been learned, I don't know.)

[jb]

Assuming this is their motive (I disagree FWIW), they're probably not wrong.

Trump has proven a few times now that not only is he a terrible candidate, but he is a drag on the rest of the ticket as well. Biden is also a bad candidate--he basically only works as a "not Trump, not too offensive to most people" sort of candidate. It turns out that DeSantis is also a pretty bad candidate. But Tim Scott and Nikki Haley would probably all beat Biden handily. Some of the other Republican candidates I don't think we have enough visibility into yet, but I suspect most of them would be more competitive than Trump.

Add to this the fact that Trump was an incredibly ineffective President, it's truly bizarre how much Republican voters adore the guy. It's honestly hard to imagine someone less well suited to delivering on their policy preferences.

[Brett Bellmore]

"Add to this the fact that Trump was an incredibly ineffective President, it’s truly bizarre how much Republican voters adore the guy."

There's something to be said for getting the who guy ineffectually does what you want, instead of effectually doing what you don't want. Trump is a product of Republican voters having it beaten into their heads, one election cycle after another, that if you elect an establishment Republican, you get what the establishment wants, not what they ran on doing.

And half his lack of effectiveness was the fact that the establishment still controlled Congress. A Republican Congress that was doing the will of the people who'd elected them would have gladly funded that wall, for instance.

[Frank Drackman]

He was so ineffective he was the first Repubiclown POTUS to actually get the “Black Genocide Act of 1973” (AKA Roe v Wade) overturned after 50+ years of Genius POTUS’s picking Warren Ham-Burlar, Brennan, Blackmun, Sandre Dee Oconnor, Anthony Kennedy, Souter, and first POTUS since Ronaldus Maximus who didn’t get us in a Wah. (Grenada didn’t count)

Frank

[jb]

And half his lack of effectiveness was the fact that the establishment still controlled Congress. A Republican Congress that was doing the will of the people who’d elected them would have gladly funded that wall, for instance.

I'm sure that it's part of it, but not nearly half. Trump didn't have a policy shop to actually try to get his own ideas through Congress. That's on him for not being interested in the mechanics of governing, not on Congress for continuing to do the normal stuff that Republican Congress does (primarily cutting taxes while spending more money to make the deficit worse).

But the lack of progress in Congress is hardly all of it, anyway. He left MANY important positions open in his administration and wasn't able to attract or hold on to good talent in most cases. His disdain for process meant that many of the things his administration tried to accomplish were rolled back by the courts, often because of stupid shit he tweeted that contradicted the arguments that the various legal teams were making to try to preserve them. He's just not a good executive and a horrible human being which makes it very hard to effectively oversee a sprawling enterprise the size of the federal government which relies on effective delegation to people who will competently do what you want them to.

* Which is stupid and ineffectual, which is why even people who don't like immigration don't really push for it. The wall is just a campaign prop.

[Brett Bellmore]

" Trump didn’t have a policy shop to actually try to get his own ideas through Congress. "

Trump had a very "civics class" idea of how the government was supposed to work. Naively, maybe, but he was actually expecting Congress to enact laws they'd run on enacting. I think it came as a bit of a shock to him that they'd actually fight to keep things they'd run on doing from happening, instead.

"Which is stupid and ineffectual, which is why even people who don’t like immigration don’t really push for it. The wall is just a campaign prop."

Not quite. The purpose of a wall isn't to stop people. It's to slow them down so that you can catch them before they disappear into the general population. It only makes sense as part of a total system, not in isolation. But Congress didn't want ANY part of that system, because they don't want illegal immigration stopped.

It's just that the Republicans in Congress have to lie about that to the voters.

As I've occasionally pointed out, the US border with Mexico amounts to less than an inch per citizen. You could built two Israeli style border walls with a mine field between, the whole length of it, in one year, and it would be about a percent of our defense budget.

That's the advantage of being a really large country: The border is tiny relative to our resources. Securing the border would be almost trivial, if our government actually wanted to do it.

They don't.

[jb]

“Trump had a very “civics class” idea of how the government was supposed to work. Naively, maybe, but he was actually expecting Congress to enact laws they’d run on enacting. I think it came as a bit of a shock to him that they’d actually fight to keep things they’d run on doing from happening, instead.”

Yes I agree that Trump did not, in fact, understand the job that he ran for and held for four years.

[Nige]

'Naively, maybe,'

If you ignore his rhetoric, you could class him as naive. Otherwise, it was monstrous egotism.

'Securing the border would be almost trivial,'

Speaking of naive.

[David Nieporent]

Securing the border would be almost trivial, if our government actually wanted to do it.

They don’t.

Dunning Kruger Causes Ignorant Area Man To Think Problems Are Simple To Solve. Story on Page B12.

[Frank Drackman]

East Germany secured theirs pretty well for 27 years. Ear-Ron secures theirs pretty well today. So does China. If we're gonna give the Country back to May-He-Co just go ahead and do it already (at least Mexican Politicians don't pretend to be honest) I'd sooner have the Sinaloa Cartel run California than the idiots running it now.

Frank

[David Nieporent]

Trump did not do what anybody other than Trump wanted, except the tiny percentage of people who just want to see the world burn.™ Setting aside that there was never a Republican Congress, the will of the people who elected Trump — a minority of the country — was to have Mexico pay for a wall, not for American taxpayers to be forced to do so.

[Nige]

Or for them to get defrauded by Steve Bannon.

[Don Nico]

"But Tim Scott and Nikki Haley would probably all beat Biden handily."
That would be a reasonable not senile ticket

[jb]

Oh, I meant either one at the top of the ticket. It would be a pretty unlikely duo on an actual ticket given they're both from South Carolina so you'd probably want some better geographical distribution.

[Frank Drackman]

Darling Nikki lost me when she slammed old people. That Bee-otch is 51, not like her Va-Jay-Jay's as tight and lubed as Taylor Swift's. But a Vivi-section Rama-lama-dindong-Swami/Tim Scott Ticket??? Could win 49 states like Nixon.

Frank

[apedad]

You're blaming the sellers but they're just giving the buyers what they want.

[Michael P]

Modern media are mostly selling page loads to advertisers. A corollary is that they don't care how many people actually read or agree with what they write as long as the advertising network thinks a real human clicked on the story.

[JasonT20]

You’re blaming the sellers but they’re just giving the buyers what they want.

Yes, I will blame a bartender for continuing to serve alcohol to someone that can barely stand up as it is.

News media does not exist to enable ignorance, cognitive bias, and would-be authoritarians. It exists to objectively inform the public of important facts. Some people in the news business might even still believe this, but too many media outlets are now owned and operated by people that don't give a shit about journalistic ethics. Instead, they are motivated entirely by their own political agenda, or they care only about ratings and ad revenue, since that determines their profits, or they are only motivated by both of those things. The people that get promoted in those companies are the ones that will follow that lead, so any journalists that still try hard to be objective are not going to have good careers.

Guys like Sean Hannity say straight up that they aren't journalists. (I recall a video clip of Hannity saying that. "I'm not a journalist. I'm a talk show host." or something very close to it.) Same was true of Bill O'Reilly, Glen Beck, and the first big star of political talk - Rush Limbaugh. Any journalism they practiced was incidental to their pursuit of ratings glory. The liberal side of things, (Anderson Cooper, Rachel Maddow, etc.) is not different in kind.

Some commentators/influencers/hosts do a better job that those named at keeping their biases from taking them off the rails completely, but the pattern is clear. All of the most well known figures in print and TV news are people that make it their job to express their opinions. Long gone are the days when nightly news anchors that managed to report the news in mostly neutral tones were the 'stars' of TV news.

[Moderation4ever]

I agree hear. Trump fatigue was one of the reason the American people fired Trump in 2020. Now we are back at it. I would hope that more is written about the other candidates running and less about Trump. We have cover the cases pretty well, let's all just set back and see how things go.

[OtisAH]

Yeah, it’s The Media keeping the focus on Big Baby. And he, poor victimized soul that he is, is uncomfortable with that. But what can he do? They won’t stop!

But if you need updates on the others, Christie is doing what he would’ve otherwise been doing on cable tv any time he wanted, which is slapping Turnip at every turn. The rest all distinguish themselves from Turnip by repeating his endless stream of nonsense about his indictments and mistreatment, and by telling us they’d do nothing different than Turnip would. Except DeSantis who distinguishes himself by playing “More fascist than thou” and failing at mimicking human emotion and a personality.

[Martinned]

I was reading Aristoteles the other day, as one does, and I noticed Book 4 of the Politics.

And another kind of democracy is for all the citizens that are not open to challenge to have a share in office, but for the law to rule; and another kind of democracy is for all to share in the offices on the mere qualification of being a citizen, but for the law to rule. Another kind of democracy is where all the other regulations are the same, but the multitude is sovereign and not the law; and this comes about when the decrees of the assembly over-ride the law. This state of things is brought about by the demagogues; for in the states under democratic government guided by law a demagogue does not arise, but the best classes of citizens are in the most prominent position; but where the laws are not sovereign, then demagogues arise; for the common people become a single composite monarch, since the many are sovereign not as individuals but collectively. Yet what kind of democracy Homer means by the words ‘no blessing is the lordship of the many’—whether he means this kind or when those who rule as individuals are more numerous, is not clear. However, a people of this sort, as being monarch, seeks to exercise monarchic rule through not being ruled by the law, and becomes despotic, so that flatterers are held in honor. And a democracy of this nature is comparable to the tyrannical form of monarchy, because their spirit is the same, and both exercise despotic control over the better classes, and the decrees voted by the assembly are like the commands issued in a tyranny, and the demagogues and the flatterers are the same people or a corresponding class, and either set has the very strongest influence with the respective ruling power, the flatterers with the tyrants and the demagogues with democracies of this kind. And these men cause the resolutions of the assembly to be supreme and not the laws, by referring all things to the people; for they owe their rise to greatness to the fact that the people is sovereign over all things while they are sovereign over the opinion of the people, for the multitude believes them. Moreover those who bring charges against the magistrates say that the people ought to judge the suits, and the people receive the invitation gladly, so that all the magistracies are put down. And it would seem to be a reasonable criticism to say that such a democracy is not a constitution at all; for where the laws do not govern there is no constitution, as the law ought to govern all things while the magistrates control particulars, and we ought to judge this to be constitutional government; if then democracy really is one of the forms of constitution, it is manifest that an organization of this kind, in which all things are administered by resolutions of the assembly, is not even a democracy in the proper sense, for it is impossible for a voted resolution to be a universal rule.

[VinniUSMC]

for in the states under democratic government guided by law a demagogue does not arise, but the best classes of citizens are in the most prominent position ... for the common people become a single composite monarch ... And these men cause the resolutions of the assembly to be supreme and not the laws, by referring all things to the people ... as the law ought to govern all things while the magistrates control particulars ... is not even a democracy in the proper sense, for it is impossible for a voted resolution to be a universal rule.

Shorter:

Democracy is bad when "top men" are not in charge and making the laws (which are universal rules, not the resolutions of mere proles).

That's why the "right" form of democracy is Aristocracy, rule by Aristotle, the top man.

[Martinned]

If that's what you're getting from this fragment, that tells me everything I need to know about you.

[VinniUSMC]

That's literally what Aristotle thought, and wrote.

Who decides what are "universal rules" to which we must all submit? Top men. Like Aristotle. When is democracy good? When the top men are in power to enforce the "universal rules" and the proles do their part and let the top men keep their "special" places.

I bet you think you're more like Aristotle.

[Martinned]

I think you're getting Aristotle confused with Plato.

More importantly, another person might note the warning about flatterers, and the observation that "where the laws do not govern there is no constitution".

[VinniUSMC]

Which laws are "the laws" which govern, and which laws are the resolutions of men? If the top men make the "universal laws", anything else is the proles' resolutions of men, and they don't deserve self-governance. Thus, if the proles are "in charge" it's tyranny.

There's a Constitution in the US. Are you of the opinion that it contains universal laws, so anything that is a-textual is thereby a resolution of the tyrannical? Since you aren't an American, it wouldn't matter to you, but if the US actually governed that way, it wouldn't look anything like the way the ancient Greeks imagined it. Certainly leftist shits wouldn't like it. Though, they're the ones who imagine themselves to be the modern day Aristotle.

[Martinned]

What are you on about? Maybe you should go back to defending Trump no matter what the law says, because it doesn't sound like coherence is your strong suit.

[VinniUSMC]

Why post quotes that you apparently don't read or have the ability to comprehend?

[Martinned]

I understand Aristotle just fine. It's your ramblings that are giving me trouble.

[VinniUSMC]

Yeah, sure.

[Bob from Ohio]

"If that’s what you’re getting from this fragment, that tells me everything I need to know about you."

It literally states that "best classes of citizens are in the most prominent position". Rule of law as determined by the ""best classes", not by the majority

[Martinned]

Yes, isn't that what you'd want from a democracy? That it puts the best people in the most prominent positions? I can see how that would confuse a Trump voter, but it still doesn't seem like a very difficult idea to grasp.

[Bob from Ohio]

"best people "

He wrote "best classes". He wasn't talking about individuals.

[Martinned]

No, he was talking about groups of individuals. This translator used "class of citizens" as a synonym for "group of citizens", not "rich people".

[bevis the lumberjack]

Electing the best to get the best in all the right spots is a great idea. When do you think we’ll start?

[Martinned]

We should at least try.

[Michael P]

Yes, we have had some improvements in governance in the past 2300 years. Constitutions, supermajorities, checks and balances, and so forth. Political science is a dismal one: A lot of asserted dichotomies are false dichotomies.

[Martinned]

A republic is nice, if you can keep it.

[Michael P]

None of those innovations require a republic.

I wonder, though: Was the translation of "law" being sovereign a mis-translation, a mis-use of the concept in the original, or a change in what the word means? That passage rails against demagogues and popular sovereignty as examples of what happens when "the multitude is sovereign and not the law", but fundamentally a sovereign -- as we conceive it today -- is the final authority for public policy. In that sense, laws cannot be sovereign unless they address all topics and are immutable. Yet we can hardly think that either Plato or Aristotle had that conception of laws. Whence the inconsistency?

[Martinned]

There is definitely a challenge of translation around works like this. (I'm OK with a bit of Latin, but my grasp of ancient Greek is basically non-existent.)

But the point works in ancient Athens regardless. Ancient Athens had laws that were not immutable, just statutes. And it had demagogues who tried to work around those laws by flattering (or bullying) the assembly into acquiescence. (Which they sometimes got away with and sometimes didn't.)

[Noscitur a sociis]

The terms in the original are νόμος and κύριος, respectively. I think the translations are reasonable, but of course neither maps perfectly to our conceptions of law or sovereignty.

[Ridgeway]

I don’t pretend to be an Aristotle scholar, but I think that when he uses “nomos,” he is often talking more about what we would call natural law, as opposed to positive law.

Here is a pretty interesting essay by Eric Voegelin that touches on this:

https://voegelinview.com/natural-law-and-aristotle-what-is-right-by-nature-pt-1/

Trigger warning: he uses the word “noetic” in the second line.

As you allude, Aristotle’s writings don’t map well to contemporary legal discussions, because most lawyers are legal realists, whether we acknowledge it or not.

[Noscitur a sociis]

I was reading Aristoteles

Is that the conventional transliteration in the Netherlands?

[Ridgeway]

It is in German, so I'd assume Dutch is similar.

IIRC, Plato is Platon in German.

[Martinned]

Yes, because we don’t randomly drop bits off the end of ancient Greeks' and Romans' names. (Except, for some reason, Plato, who we refer to as the English do.)

[not guilty]

The trial judge assigned to the Donald Trump prosecution, Scott McAfee, is a judicial neophyte, having been appointed to the bench last February. He was previously a career prosecutor, first in Fulton County and then in the U. S. Attorney's office. While at the University of Georgia’s law school, he was the vice president of the Federalist Society, a conservative law group, and was the treasurer for the Law Republicans, which was described as serving “conservative, moderate and libertarian” law students. https://www.nytimes.com/2023/08/15/us/elections/scott-mcafee-trump-judge.html

I wonder if Trump will kvetch about him.

[Martinned]

I'm sure it's suddenly some constitutional violation to appoint judges who are a) former prosecutors, and b) conservative.

[Kazinski]

The prosecutor might.

But I think Trump will still try to have his case removed to federal court.

[Armchair Lawyer]

Especially after the Fulton DA wants to do the trial...The week before the state primary.

[not guilty]

If Judge McAfee runs for election as a Republican, I suspect that his pretrial rulings will influence whether he faces opposition in a primary.

[Martinned]

That sounds like a great way to do rule of law.

[Dr. Ed 2]

Or he is appointed to the Federal Bench.

Why shouldn't Trump reward friendly judges?

[John F. Carr]

He needs the Senate's consent. When blue slips are in fashion he needs the consent of both Senators from Georgia. A reward for a not guilty verdict might not be consented to.

[not guilty]

Trump may attempt to remove the case against him to federal court, but he might want to be careful what he asks for. It looks like Mark Meadows notice of removal is assigned to U. S. District Judge Steve C. Jones. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steve_C._Jones Trump might prefer to remain before a white Republican judge in state court.

[Alpheus W Drinkwater]

If the case is removed to federal court, it becomes eligible for Presidential Pardon, right? Perhaps that consideration overrides all others, in Mr. Trump's mind.

[not guilty]

I haven't researched it, but I don't think the presidential pardon power would come into play. A criminal prosecution removed to federal court is still an action for violation of state law.

[Alpheus W Drinkwater]

Aha! Interesting.

[apedad]

Dear God,

Is this the real truth?

Humans are a failed, prototype creature and since you’re a benevolent god, you didn’t want to merely throw us in a dumpster but instead put us on planet Earth and gave us a bunch of good stuff to nurture ourselves.

But since we were a failed experiment, you didn’t want us traipsing about your Universe messing things up either.

You also didn’t want us to easily escape but (again because you’re so benevolent), you didn’t want us to feel imprisoned on Earth either.

You couldn’t put up a (visible) cage or fence around the planet to keep us in (because then we would feel bad), so you used gravity and a thick atmosphere to make it nigh impossible to leave the planet – and that worked for thousands of years.

Additionally, you made it that even if we were able to escape, the ‘outside’ was extremely harsh and the distances to anything habitable were immense.

But like all prisons, inmates do eventually figure out a way to escape.

And that’s kinda where we are now.

Amiright?

Sincerely,

apedad

Ps. No wishes this week just;

"Thank you, Lord, for thinkin' 'bout me
I'm alive and doin' fine"

a.

[VinniUSMC]

If there is a "God", I'd wager this is a likely scenario. Why would a being with that kind of power stop at one tiny planet in the unimaginably vast universe (likely even multiverse)? The dinosaurs were largely wiped out unlike humanity, because they got boring and lacked connection.

This is just as likely as the simulation theory. Though, I wouldn't, in either case, call that creator "God". Probably just some higher dimensional being (one of many), and we are one of trillions of simulations/experiments that are in the collection of a society of beings that are, to humanity, as unimaginable as we are to an amoeba. Not "God", just on a whole different scale of existence.

[John F. Carr]

Greg Egan's novel Quarantine has Earth sealed off from the universe because humans are such troublemakers.

[Nelson]

I love Greg Egan. He has some interesting ideas and includes a moral element that most writers can't handle as deftly.

[bevis the lumberjack]

Dear God

Please go ahead and smite this guy so this series of stupid, pointless, tiresome posts will stop.

TIA.

Sincerely

The Rest of Us

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

If you didn't like pointless, stupid, and tiresome, you wouldn't be at the Volokh Conspiracy.

[apedad]

Former Special Agent in Charge of the New York FBI Counterintelligence Division Pleads Guilty to Conspiring to Violate U.S. Sanctions on Russia

Former Special Agent in Charge (SAC) of the FBI Counterintelligence Division in New York, Charles McGonigal, 54, of New York City, pleaded guilty today to conspiring to violate the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA) and to commit money laundering in connection with his 2021 agreement to provide services to Oleg Deripaska, a sanctioned Russian oligarch.

According to court documents, on April 6, 2018, the U.S. Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) sanctioned Russian oligarch Oleg Deripaska for having acted or purported to act on behalf of a senior official of the Government of the Russian Federation and for operating in the energy sector of the Russian Federation economy. The U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia affirmed the sanctions against Deripaska, finding, among other things, that OFAC’s determination that Deripaska had acted as an agent of Russian President Vladimir Putin was supported by the evidence.

McGonigal faces up to five years in prison for each count and is scheduled to be sentenced on Dec. 14. A federal district court judge will determine any sentence after considering the U.S. Sentencing Guidelines and other statutory factors.

https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/former-special-agent-charge-new-york-fbi-counterintelligence-division-pleads-guilty

THROW THE ENTIRE BOOK AT THIS ASSHOLE.

Note: There's a link to his signed plea agreement.

[Commenter_XY]

Another corrupt FBI employee. I agree that the book should be thrown at him, but I very much doubt that actually happens. If they do put him in prison, can we put him in general population after announcing to the prisoners there his former occupation?

[Martinned]

Today in "oops" (on various counts): https://rozenberg.substack.com/p/heathrow-gun-carrier-freed

A man who was imprisoned after a gun and ammunition were found in his carry-on baggage at Heathrow airport was released yesterday because the Court of Appeal decided that his original sentence had been manifestly excessive.
(...)
Rogelio Ahumada y Otero, from Mexico, had intended to fly from London to Madrid in May of this year. His carry-on baggage was put through a scanner at Heathrow. Security staff found an automatic pistol in one pocket of his bag and cartridges in another. The gun was in working order and the cartridges were compatible with it.
(...)
An adult convicted of possessing a prohibited weapon must be sentenced to a minimum of five years’ imprisonment “unless the court is of the opinion that there are exceptional circumstances which relate to the offence or to the offender and justify not doing so”.
(...)
Giving the judgment of the court, Ellenbogen noted a dispute between the two barristers over whether it had been agreed between them that if the judge found that the defendant’s ignorance of what he was carrying amounted to “exceptional circumstances”, the starting point would be a non-custodial sentence.
(...)
[Crown Court judge] Johnson should have started with six years, reduced that to three years because of the exceptional circumstances and taken a third off for the guilty plea, she explained.

[Brett Bellmore]

On the one hand, when I pack for air travel I'm generally aware of every last thing in my baggage, because my bags were empty before I started packing, so I handled every last bit of it while packing. And because I'm perfectly aware that there ARE prohibited items, and I own some of them.

So I'm not inclined to think that a guy would accidentally fly with a gun and ammo in a carry on bag. This guy was pretty careless, at the least.

On the other hand, I did fly cross country once, and on returning home was fishing around in my pocket for my keys, and came across a 9mm cartridge. (A misfire at the range I'd just tossed in my pocket.) So I'd be hypocritical if I said it couldn't happen.

Anyway, it strikes me as kind of strange that an accidental offense that harmed no one would be treated as so awful. They really are nuts in England when it comes to guns.

[Martinned]

Like I said, this was pretty "oops" on several counts:
- When going on a Transatlantic flight, most people wouldn't "accidentally" pack a gun. (Flying within the US is not the same, obviously.)
- Assuming the lack of intent was proven, it was pretty odd that the crown court didn't reflect that (more) in the sentencing.

[Martinned]

Anyway, it strikes me as kind of strange that an accidental offense that harmed no one would be treated as so awful. They really are nuts in England when it comes to guns.

I can only imagine how relaxed they would be in a US airport if someone just walked in there with a gun. After all, security checks at US airports are famously pretty laid back.

[Brett Bellmore]

Oh, yeah, they'd react badly in the instant, when it was unclear what was going on.

But, later, in the trial, if it were established that it was entirely by accident? Outside of a few nutcase jurisdictions, the absence of mens rea would be decisive, I would think. Nobody got hurt and you didn't intend to do it? Slap on the wrist.

[Kazinski]

Its not that a big deal. It happens about 17 times a day somewhere in the US.

"The Transportation Security Administration found 6,542 guns at airport security checkpoints last year, and almost 90% were loaded. The number of firearms detected at checkpoints has increased every year since 2010, with the exception of 2020, when air travel was depressed due to the pandemic.

The TSA also has increased the maximum fine for those found trying to carry a gun through a security checkpoint, from $13,910 to $14,950.

Even so, the takeaway is that nothing will change, and that 2023 will likely report even more firearms discovered at checkpoints."
https://www.usatoday.com/story/opinion/2023/01/26/tsa-raises-fines-record-guns-luggage-airport-security/11085490002/

[Kazinski]

Yeah pretty embarrassing when your stopped transiting in South Korea and you've got a .357 cartridge down in the bottom of your backpack.

[Krayt]

Given the xrays nowadays, is that even a thing? It's not possible to do, so "sneaking" such is not a possibility.

[Martinned]

That's how this guy got caught.

[Voize]

It’s also how he didn’t get caught, if he can be believed that he passed airport security screening in both Mexico City and Paris with that handgun in his carry-on bag.

[Dr. Ed 2]

You'd be surprised at the number of weapons that undercover DHS employees are able to smuggle aboard planes, and in one case, the employee also lost custody of the gun and NO ONE knows where it went.

[John F. Carr]

Under U.S. federal law the five year mandatory minimum is for possession of a gun during a crime of violence of drug crime, not for simple possession.

[Martinned]

How is that working out for you?

[John F. Carr]

It's a great country to run a private prison in.

[Bob from Ohio]

Us government does not currently use private prisons. It was only about 10% of prisoners before 2021.

[apedad]

Militant far-right leader Ammon Bundy out on bail after arrest for outstanding contempt charge; supporters rally

Bundy was arrested the next day and removed from the high school fundraiser in handcuffs to much booing, a video posted on Bundy’s social media account shows.

Bundy’s penchant for arms and his anti-law-enforcement attitude appear to be what prompted Gem County Sheriff’s to go about arresting the 47-year-old at the fundraiser instead of at a private residence.

One Gem County sheriff, Donnie Wunder, told Boise State Public Radio last week that law enforcement were apprehensive about sending officers to Bundy’s house to service legal notices because they “didn’t want to risk harm” to deputies “over a civil issue.”

https://lawandcrime.com/crime/militant-far-right-leader-ammon-bundy-out-on-bail-after-arrest-for-outstanding-contempt-charge-supporters-rally/

Please note, these are local law enforcement actions - not feds/FBI.

[Dr. Ed 2]

The whole thing about Waco is that (a) David Koresh routinely went into town, alone and unarmed, to purchase supplies -- AND (b) the local Sheriff knew this -- AND (c) he told the ATF this and offered to help arrest Koresh in town.

Instead they had to show off -- how many ATF guys died that day???

[Michael P]

Fewer than the number of weird cultists who died, so that counted as a win for the Clinton team?

[Frank Drackman]

But Because the Children!!!!!!!!!!

[Brett Bellmore]

It was "Operation Showtime" not "Operation Routine Arrest". That's why they had multiple cameras running to record the whole thing.

Shame they had to retroactively malfunction like that.

[Noscitur a sociis]

The whole thing about Waco

Buckle up, everyone!

[Brett Bellmore]

It wasn't the whole thing, but it was true. Koresh got wind of the feds plans, and offered to invite them in for a peaceful tour. They responded by rushing the schedule on their violent raid.

[shawn_dude]

Given the armed standoff with BLM agents at his dad's Nevada ranch, this was a wise choice.

[Allutz]

We know its local law enforcement instead of the FBI, because the FBI would have conducted a 6 AM no-knock raid in the hopes of executing Bundy instead of having to deal with pesky things like "due process."

[dwb68]

List your favorite sci-fi tropes.

[Frank Drackman]

That Twilight Zone episodes 1: where the guy's imprisoned on an Asteroid and they send him a hot chick robot for "Companionship"
2: the Friendly Aliens here to help out us ignorant Earthlings leave a book behind at the United Nations, guess what the subject is? 3: Professor from Gilligan's Island goes back in time to prevent Lincolns Assassination (wish I could do that) 4: Anne Francis returns golden thimble to department store, finds floor deserted,

Frank "dodododododododododododododo"

[Brett Bellmore]

"Local teens band together to cope with problem the authorities can't handle." Lots of movies like The Blob, but also happened in Evolution, too. (Selsun Blue saves the world!)

One of my favorites, though, that rejected all tropes, was "The Magnetic Monster". Scientists racing to destroy a new isotope that's sucking in energy from around itself and geometrically growing in mass, before it can destroy the Earth. The real race is to do it, not before the destruction commences, but just before destroying it becomes too difficult to have a chance of pulling off.

[Alpheus W Drinkwater]

The original Blob movie with Steve McQueen was filmed in my hometown, Phoenixville, PA. That theater still exists, and they hold an annual Blobfest there every year, with participants recreating the scene where they all run terrified out of the theater.

[Nige]

Hyper-intelligent space-ships gossip about humans behind their backs.

[Sarcastr0]

Cascading sociological effects from one change, either in history or I tech or in biology.

[Nige]

I always liked the ‘isolated or alien society put under extrernal pressures that accelerate technological adapation,’ though it has been replaced with the more sobering and arguably apposite ‘human society overwhelmed or at the point of being overwhelmed by self-created pressures.’ (The John Brunner Arc.)

[Brett Bellmore]

Yeah, that one with the scientist who had the high speed artificial lifeforms in a giant terrarium, and was forcing them to generate technological advances by imposing horrible threats on them. Wish I could recall the titled.

[David Nieporent]

That's not a precise description of Sandkings, but it's not that far off.

[Noscitur a sociis]

I doubt that’s the story Brett Bellmore is thinking of, but it is an excellent story.

[David Nieporent]

By a (relatively) young GRRM!

[shawn_dude]

Kim Stanley Robinson and his Mars trilogy is a great example of this for humans.

[bevis the lumberjack]

Radiation in real life makes living organisms waste away.

In sci-fi movies it either makes things get huge (spiders, ants, the 50 ft woman, Godzilla) or it evolves them into gross deformed creatures with superpowers (Spider-Man, for example).

I suppose nobody would watch realistic movies about exposure to radiation. Something like “Putin’s List”.

[Frank Drackman]

"Radiation in real life"??
you mean like the Electromagnetic Radiation from the Sun that's only responsible for all life on Earth?
Jeez-us your Pubic Screw-el Ed-Jew-ma-cation is showing.

Frank

[Nige]

Giant radioactive mutants were a pretty good metaphor for the atomic bomb, though.

For the other we'll always have the end of Wrath Of Khan.

[David Nieporent]

I don't think Spider-man is gross or deformed.

[bevis the lumberjack]

Yeah I caught that after I hit enter. But thanks for the all important correction. I feel properly chastised.

[dwb68]

also not quite true: There are "radiophilic" bacteria that have adapted to high-radiation environments by having extra copies of critical genes along with better DNA repair mechanisms.

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

[Brett Bellmore]

And there at least seem to be a fair number of bacteria and fungi that actually derive significant metabolic energy from ambient radiation in places like uranium ore deposits.

Radiotrophic fungus (The wikipedia author is a bit more suspicious of the research than I am.)

[dwb68]

There is a name for the hypothesis that for every energy source, there is a bacteria that utilize it (although I cant recall its name). High energy protons could be captured to use as energy, or other kinds of radiation, so I dont see why not. Its a question of the mechanism.

[Alpheus W Drinkwater]

Since I was a kid, I was always fascinated/terrified by the space object smashing into Earth trope. It's been done to death by now, but when done well I still find it fascinating.

[Frank Drackman]

"When Worlds Collide" (1951 Paramount) scared the wee out of me as a kid

[Brett Bellmore]

It was actually pretty realistically done. Except for the negligible chance that the incoming planet would be habitable, of course.

In "A bucket of air", Earth gets thrown out of its orbit by a rogue planet's gravitational influence, and they're trying to cope with the whole planet freezing down to cryogenic temperatures.

[David Nieporent]

Lucifer's Hammer being the book that immediately comes to mind.

[Alpheus W Drinkwater]

Yes, absolutely. Also Arthur C. Clarke's 'The Hammer of God.' There have been a few good ones, and some really bad ones. The movie 'Deep Impact' was supposedly based on The Hammer of God, but other than the basic premise I didn't see much resemblance.

[Nige]

Just started listening to Neal Stephenson's Seveneves.

[Alpheus W Drinkwater]

I haven't read that one yet, heard it was good but very long.

[Noscitur a sociis]

It is indeed both, like all of Stephenson’s stuff.

[Nige]

It is very long, and curiously disjointed thanks to a time-shift halfway through, but it is very good. I had serious reservations about his climate-change thriller Termination Shock, and revisiting some of his older stuff is interesting. His utopian vision of everybody working together to save the world or save humanity is at odds with the behaviours of everybody in the real world faced with a real threat.

[Noscitur a sociis]

His utopian vision of everybody working together to save the world or save humanity

Don’t think that’s how I’d describe Seveneves!

[Nige]

No? Two years to create a functional long-term space habitat before Earth comes uninhabitable? Utopian might seem the wrong word, but it is ultimately a hopeful novel despite the bleakness of the catastrophe.

[Sarcastr0]

Also aspirational sci fi. Star Trek and Sector General spring to mind.

[Commenter_XY]

Yes to aspirational sci-fi. I really like movies like Interstellar, and movies where there is heavy-duty exploration; discover new worlds, civilization kind of thing. The shoot 'em up space movies do not have a lot of appeal (original Star Wars was pretty good).

As a child, when we went to the Moon, I was convinced that Space Travel would be a common thing. Never happened. That is a tremendous disappointment.

[Brett Bellmore]

No kidding. I grew up watching Apollo on TV as a kid, and just naturally expected I'd be ending up as crew on a space ship. (In the engine room, of course, not the command deck; I'm more of a Scotty than Kirk.) I helped found an L-5 society chapter in college.

Then things just sort of petered to a stop, for a generation or more. The political use of it had expired, and the programs had been taken over by bureaucrats who saw it as just a job.

[Sarcastr0]

To be Taught, if Fortunate by Becky Chambers is another good one.

[Frank Drackman]

"E for Effort" short Sci Fi story from 1947 by T.L. Sherred
about a Dude (Hispanic, BTW, pretty progressive for 1947) and a friend who invents a "Time Viewer" and produces Historical movies using film of the actual events, of course all the Experts ridicule the guy, "Jesus doesn't look like Jesus!!!!" They go on to make more contemporary movies showing the real behind the scenes events of the Revolutionary/Civil/and World Wars, and are of course

"Cancelled" Spoiler Alert!!!

Cliff Notes Version here https://schlock-value.com/2021/03/28/e-for-effort/

Frank

[Nige]

Streetwise hacker-punks vs evil corporations is always fun.

[shawn_dude]

"Do you want to play a game?"

[Magister]

I find fascinating explorations of alternate forms of intelligence: Vernor Vinge's A Fire Upon The Deep, Adrian Tchaikovsky's Children of Time, and sequels.

[Sarcastr0]

All of these books are bangers, co-sign.

[shawn_dude]

Visually, Spaceballs The Movie pretty much covered 90% of movie tropes.

For books, I'd say children will always succeed where educated adults fail, Humans are plucky space newcomers who somehow always solve problems older, more advanced species cannot (David Brin's stuff, Star Trek, etc).

[Nelson]

David Brin's commentary was that superior technology, rigidly applied, will be overcome by innovation and flexible thinking. His point was always that doing it the same way it's always been done isn't the best strategy.

[Dr. Ed 2]

Anyone remember the mid 80s when the national speed limit was still 55 but everyone was going at least 80 and it had become a national joke?

Law ceases to exist when a majority (or sizable minority) of the population loses respect for it. Marijuana is still a Schedule I substance that is legally sold in many states and people openly shoot up Heroin on our streetcorners.

What the Lynching of The Donald will do is destroy the legitimacy of our court system as a whole, and the concept of a "rule of law" along with it. It their relentless pursuit of the Evil Orange Man, the left is chopping down all the legal protections of individuals that exist in this country -- what legal protections will they then hide behind when the tide turns against them?

Remember the BLM schmucks who were blocking interstate highways? At least in snow country, there is heavy equipment capable of clearing the entire highway in just one pass at 40-45 MPH -- four plow trucks with a right wing deployed, dumping into the path of the truck that is to the right and slightly behind it -- this is also how they clear airport runways.

People are a lot lighter than snow, the equipment is physically capable of splashing body parts off the road just like so much wet slush.

It's Rule of Law that prevents us from clearing highways this way -- the very Rule of Law being destroyed this summer....

[Martinned]

Law ceases to exist when a majority (or sizable minority) of the population loses respect for it.

Like the man said:

1.3.32 Iulianus libro 84 digestorum
(...)
1. Inveterata consuetudo pro lege non immerito custoditur, et hoc est ius quod dicitur moribus constitutum. Nam cum ipsae leges nulla alia ex causa nos teneant, quam quod iudicio populi receptae sunt, merito et ea, quae sine ullo scripto populus probavit, tenebunt omnes: nam quid interest suffragio populus voluntatem suam declaret an rebus ipsis et factis? Quare rectissime etiam illud receptum est, ut leges non solum suffragio legis latoris, sed etiam tacito consensu omnium per desuetudinem abrogentur.

But I think Irnerius had the better of the argument when he pointed out that this logic hinged on the ability of Roman citizens to come together in an assembly and vote laws, something that obviously no longer existed in his time or in ours.

[Sarcastr0]

You remain a bloody minded moron whose cries are thinly disguised windows into how you feel and what you wish.

But speed limits, even when slower than the flow of traffic, have an effect on motorist speed.

[Ed Grinberg]

re: Dr. Ed being "bloody-minded"
Once you get rid of the rule of law, you'll be surprised how many "bloody-minded" people there are all of a sudden. I bet even then the idea that it's you who created them will not occur to you...

[Sarcastr0]

These proceedings are all about the rule of law.

You want to go start some political violence, go for it, I hope you fail to kill even yourself.
But I think you are just another frustrated coward.

[Mr. Hook]

There are two mutually reinforcing fantasies nourishing these kinds of people (let's call them, oh, how about Eds). One is that Eds are the sole, true victims of history. The other is that one day a violent retribution will come. It's a "very online" kind of thing because reality is so scary.

And what happens when one of the Eds acts on the fantasy and shoot up a school or a government office? The other Eds declare that it's a false flag operation! A set-up by the Deep State! An antifa/BLM stunt! Choosing between real-world action and consequences versus the fantasy of therapeutic rage and armageddon, Eds prefer the latter.

[Bob from Ohio]

"These proceedings are all about the rule of law."

LOL

Its a US version of Alexei Navalny.

[Nige]

Is there a Russian political prisoner who wouldn’t piss on you for making the comparison?

[John F. Carr]

In general speed limits in America don't have an effect on traffic speed. If you look closely enough and report selectively you can see little correlations, like traffic speed in Portland increasing by 0.1 mph after the speed limit was reduced to 20. But saying the speed limit change there caused the speed change is a stretch.

[John F. Carr]

After writing the above post, the next ad I saw read

"Reckless Driving? Speeding? Call [lawyer] now for professional legal advice and affordable representation."

[Commenter_XY]

That is pretty funny.

[Sarcastr0]

Rising and lowering speed limits is correlated with driver speed. I am on vacation and so apologize I can’t link the study, but it was recent.

[Magister]

https://nacto.org/publication/city-limits/the-need/speed-limit-changes-have-big-impacts/

A growing body of research shows that speed limit changes alone can lead to measurable declines in speeds and crashes, even absent enforcement or engineering changes.

https://www.nhtsa.gov/book/countermeasures/countermeasures/42-reduce-and-enforce-speed-limits

Reducing speeds through lowering speed limits is a time-honored countermeasure. Evidence shows, though, that actual speeds are reduced by only a fraction of the reduction in speed limits – typically 1-2 mph speed reduction for every 5-mph speed limit reduction. However, even 1-2 mph reductions in average speed are estimated to yield substantial fatal and injury crash reductions over all, with higher percentage reductions on streets with lower initial speeds

[Mr. Bumble]

From Instapundit:

DEMOCRACY DIES IN DARKNESS:

Where are the 41,000 hours of J6 tapes?

Where is the Nashville Trans Terrorist manifesto?

Where is the Ghislaine Maxwell child
Trafficking client list?

Where is the “J6 bomber”?

None of these things have been released for the same reason:

They would destroy the MSM narrative

— DC_Draino (@DC_Draino) August 10, 2023

Related: It’s democracy in the dark without Nashville shooter manifesto’s release.

[Nige]

Why would they release the J6 bomber?

One possible reason for the lack of release of the rest, of course, is that unreleased they allow conspiracy theorists to exploit ignorance, suspicion and paranoia to drive senationalistic outrage and speculation. If one were inventing an overarching narrative around three completely seperate unrelated things, at any rate.

[Brett Bellmore]

The only positive spin I can see is that they don't want to hand out pointers on how to escape being identified while planting a bomb under panopticon surveillance. They followed him through video cameras, after the fact, through the subway, and into a car, and even got a look at the license plate, and STILL couldn't identify him?

I'm sure they don't want people knowing how to pull THAT off.

[Nige]

Why does there need to be any spin at all? Wouldn’t you prefer to know the actual reasons rather than treat them as potential narrative hooks where invention and speculation are more useful than facts?

(Incidentally, why do fierce individualists who distrust state power get performatively suspicious and cynical when their society fails to operate as an inescapable panopticon in specific instances?)

[Brett Bellmore]

It's just a fact that DC IS a panopticon state. Whether you think that's bad or good, it's a fact. Cameras all over the place going to archive, stingrays monitoring phone calls and locations. Honestly, it would be cheaper if they just required people to wear a wire and tracking collar while there.

[Nige]

You clearly have more faith in the supposed panopticon than I do. Often seems more detrimental to solid plod-work than not.

[Brett Bellmore]

Hey, what was I saying? That they are skating around the bomber, and how they lost track of him, because they don't want to give out hints on out to evade that security.

That's a theory based on the security actually NOT being reliable. If I thought it was fool proof I'd be asking why they don't want us to know who he his, since they'd 'obviously have long since identified him'.

[Nige]

Gotcha. Certainly the surveillance state would hate for people to think that it was a terrible way to do actual law enforcement; it has its strengths, obviously, but the Hong Kong riots provided any interested party with a wealth of evasion methods.

It's always nice when we approach agreement, Brett!

[SRG2]

Where are the 41,000 hours of J6 tapes?

IIRC McCarthy has them all and released some to Fox News promising to release all of them later to everyone.

[Longtobefree]

Democracy may die in darkness, but it is being murdered in daylight.

[Alpheus W Drinkwater]

There is of course a very good reason for not releasing terrorist's manifestos, that has nothing to do with MSM narrative, whatever that means. Terrorism and mass shooting events being seen as a good way to publicize one's manifesto would only encourage more such events.

[Brett Bellmore]

That's a good reason for not publishing it on page one. It's not a good reason for refusing to even let the state legislature, about to go into a special session about this specific event, see it.

No, they're acting like they've got something to hide. And the usual reason they act like that is because... they've got something to hide.

[Nige]

But... what? The very worst would be is a murderous trans person saying 'kill all cis people!' Which is terrible, obviously, but not exactly a rallying cry likely to be taken up by anyone else.

[Dr. Ed 2]

The USSS has some extraordinary powers when it comes to protecting their protectees, including DJ Trump.

The Sheriff might think he is going to book Trump in his jail, but I have no doubt that the USSS is going to want the social security number of everyone in the building and might not only some of the guards but most of the prisoners won’t pass muster.

So they won’t let Trump into the building.

And if the Sheriff or DA pushes it, they’ll get arrested instead.

[Brett Bellmore]

And yet, we're not violating the Nobility clause. No siree, Bob.

Not sure the SS will actually prevent the Democrats from getting to parade Trump in front of a camera wearing the traditional orange jumpsuit, though.

[Mr. Bumble]

If they're doing their job the SS should not allow Trump anywhere near the shithole Fulton County Jail.

[Dr. Ed 2]

OR order it to be totally evacuated first.

Your choice, Sheriff....

[bevis the lumberjack]

Who had 9am EDT in the Ed’s First Violent Threat of the day pot? You’re the lucky winner!!!!!!

[Michael P]

Where do you see a violent threat? Suggesting the evacuation of a building full of criminals for the safety of a protectee is extreme, but I don't think it's a threat.

[John F. Carr]

He was arraigned in New York without any major trouble.

[Mr. Bumble]

But wasn't it all done at the courthouse?

[David Nieporent]

The USSS has some extraordinary powers when it comes to protecting their protectees, including DJ Trump.

[Citation needed.] What "extraordinary powers" do they have to protect a former president?

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

Maybe the best way to handle this would be to send Trump to Guantanamo before (and perhaps after) trial.

He would be very secure; the Secret Service would be in near-ideal operating conditions.

[Brett Bellmore]

Says somebody who's apparently not attended an event where one was present. Former Presidents aren't quite as bad as current Presidents, (Who are essentially roving police state zones.) but, yeah, the SS gets pretty over the top about protecting them.

[Noscitur a sociis]

And what “extraordinary powers” do you think they have to effectuate those efforts?

[Frank Drackman]

As a Native Jaw-Jan (Born at Crawford Wong Hospital, the noted Chinese Anesthesiologist who used Ether years before that fraud Morton in Bah-Ston) the following is so routine nobody even notices,
and since most of the Conspirators have the attention span (and mind) of a Flea, I'll summarize, Fulton County inmate in custody since 2019 dies in the Fulton County Jail
Yeah, 2019 and they still haven't tried him, because well,
see "CPT"

A Georgia inmate who was found unresponsive in a medical unit cell at a jail currently under federal investigation later died at an area hospital, authorities said Saturday.

Medical personnel resuscitated Christopher Smith, 34, after a detention officer at the Fulton County Jail found him Thursday. He was transported to Grady Memorial Hospital and pronounced dead at about 5:30 a.m. Friday, the sheriff's office said in a news release. The county's Medical Examiner's Office will conduct an autopsy to determine a cause of death, authorities said.

Smith had been in custody since Oct. 6, 2019. He was being held without bond on several unspecified felony and misdemeanor charges, the sheriff's office said.

Frank

[not guilty]

A panel of the Fifth Circuiit Court of Appeals has vacated in part and affirmed in part District Judge Matthew Kacsmaryk's execrable ruling regarding FDA approval of mifepristone. https://s3.documentcloud.org/documents/23911247/5th-circuit-ruling-on-mifepristone-access.pdf Its order remains stayed pending Supreme Court review.

The appellate court's analysis of the plaintiffs' Article III standing is more detailed than the district court's but it is nevertheless fatally flawed. The irreducible constitutional minimum of standing contains three elements. First, the plaintiff must have suffered an "injury in fact" -- an invasion of a legally protected interest which is (a) concrete and particularized, and (b) actual or imminent, not conjectural or hypothetical. Second, there must be a causal connection between the injury and the conduct complained of-the injury has to be fairly traceable to the challenged action of the defendant, and not the result of the independent action of some third party not before the court. Third, it must be likely, as opposed to merely speculative, that the injury will be redressed by a favorable decision. Lujan v. Defenders of Wildlife, 504 U.S. 555, 560-61 (1992).

The plaintiff-doctors’ theory of injury in fact appears to be that if mifepristone stays on the market, other doctors will prescribe mifepristone to their pregnant patients, the pregnant patients will suffer side effects, and then the patients will switch doctors and come to the plaintiff-doctors. This, in turn, will injure the plaintiff-doctors because it will divert their attention from their other patients, potentially force them to complete “unfinished abortions,” and possibly expose them to malpractice lawsuits. By contrast, if mifepristone is off the market, these women will elect to carry their babies to term (as opposed to seeking surgical abortions), thus preventing the plaintiff-doctors from facing these risks. (H/t Adam Unikowski.)

The majority of the Court of Appeals panel simply ignores the redressability prong. A pregnant patient who is denied mifepristone has three options: an abortion using misoprostol only, a surgical abortion, or carrying the pregnancy to term. Each of these options poses greater risks than a mifepristone/misoprostol abortion. That makes it more likely that the pregnant patients will suffer side effects, and then the patients will switch doctors and come to the plaintiff-doctors. This, in turn, will injure the plaintiff-doctors because it will divert their attention from their other patients, potentially force them to complete “unfinished abortions,” and possibly expose them to malpractice lawsuits.

[loki13]

Judge Ho continues his indefensible lines of analysis.

Between the opinion here, and the en banc "don't ever use this because people will laugh at you" concurrence, Ho is really trying to set himself up as King of Crazy Island.

[loki13]

(Sorry, I should have said that the en banc was Sambrano.)

[jb]

Yeah, Judge Ho is a good writer but since he's also a partisan hack it often means good writing covering up for crazy "reasoning".

Can't the anti-abortion people find some woman who took mifepristone and had bad side effects to help give them some colorable notion of standing? They're just highlighting how nonchalantly some of these judges will treat legal principles to get to the outcome they want with these cases...

[John F. Carr]

I think Judge Ho expectes to be reversed by the Supreme Court. The majority's compromise of going back to 2016 instead of 2000 will not be good enough. If his opinion doesn't matter in a legal sense, why not say what is on his mind?

[Bob from Ohio]

"execrable ruling"

3 circuit judges upheld most of it.

[NOVA Lawyer]

And not guilty noted that while also explaining why the Fifth Circuit's reasoning is "fatally flawed." And he's right.

Your appeal to authority is weak.

[Martinned]

Jonathan Adler has promised us a VC post shortly.

[Jacob Grimes]

I'm not sure I follow the fourth paragraph. If the person gets a surgical elective abortion, it won't be from the plaintiff doctors. If they carry it to term and have it delivered by the plaintiff doctors, the plaintiff doctors won't be helping with abortions. Sure, the pregnant women COULD take misoprostol improperly, and they could also decide to try to remove the fetus themselves with a kitchen knife. Both would divert doctors' attention.
And assuming that carrying the child to term would lead to more complications than taking the drug, and even that it lead to the same (or more) number of abortions, the plaintiff doctors would still not be participating in an elective abortion.

In any case, your point is academic because the opinion specifically denies the plaintiff doctors' attempt to invalidate the initial approval of the drug, and they have clear standing due to the increased complications from the amendments regarding its use.

[NOVA Lawyer]

First, I don't buy the "they are harmed because they might, by virtue of their chosen profession of being a doctor, be 'participating in [more] elective abortion[s].'" That opens the standing door wider than perhaps it's ever been. It's a very tangential harm that the change in the regulation does not directly affect you, but by virtue of other people's greater freedom, you may have more clients, some of whom you'd rather not have.

Second, and more directly to your point: It is not true "they have clear standing due to the increased complications from the amendments regarding its use." It's not at all clear. You're still comparing the wrong base rate, it seems to me. The women who have access to mifepristone because of the 2016 amendments to the regulations have a higher risk of complications from use of the drug than the smaller group of women who had access to the drug prior to the 2016 amendments. But that's comparing the wrong fruits.

Apples to apples is to compare the likely complications that will be experienced by the women who have access due to the 2016 amendments and would choose to utilize that access if they have access to the drug and if they don't. If the alternative choices without the drug (continuing the pregnancy, surgical abortion, misopristol only abortion, or black market mifepristone) result in a higher rate of complications than using the drug as allowed and directed in the regulations with the 2016 amendments, then there may not be increased net complications. The only relevant comparison is not really discussed in the opinion.

Consequently, it is far from clear that the physicians have standing, even accepting that higher complications to patients with resulting increased interventions by physicians would confer standing. And I think that's a pretty tenuous ground for standing anyway.

(Similarly, the idea that they might face higher chance of a malpractice suit by virtue of, allegedly, treating higher risk patients, has to be offset against the increased revenue/compensation they generate by treating more patients. Maybe there's evidence that is a net loss, but the opinion doesn't even engage with that analysis. They just accept that there will be some riskier patients and, so, assume overall insurance and malpractice liability will be higher without considering offsetting increased income from these alleged additional patients requiring additional care.)

[NOVA Lawyer]

I agree with you on standing. It looks like really thin gruel for all the reasons you state and more.

But can we also all agree, regardless of your preferred policy preference here, that this ruling was profoundly anti-libertarian, pro-regulation, and pro-big government. The argument is that the government may not stop exercising its power to limit the freedom of citizens because, in loosening government's chokehold on doctor/patient freedom, some other doctors may be affected by free people's free choices.

Surely a libertarian, small government view would be in favor of making it as easy as possible for the government to regulate less. All the hoops should be for the government to regulate more.

[not guilty]

Adam Unikowsky has a detailed takedown of the Fifth Circuit's standing analysis. https://adamunikowsky.substack.com/p/the-fifth-circuits-mifepristone-opinion Lengthy, but well worth reading.

[David Nieporent]

Unikowsky is too kind. For the sake of doing legal analysis, he treats this is a serious opinion and then shows why it's flawed. But it's not a serious opinion. The judges here weren't even pretending to do law. They don't like abortion. That's all this is.

[NOVA Lawyer]

I think the merits portion also has problems. The government adequately and fully considered each element of the changes, but, according to the en banc, didn't adequately comment on the combined effect of the amendments. Which seems silly to me. It's akin to saying the government could have made each of the changes separately, in seriatim, and would have passed muster, but doing them all at once, they had to give additional explanation.

The Fifth Circuit noted that agency action should be upheld unless the agency "entirely fail[ed] to consider an important aspect of the problem." The en banc majority finds the FDA "entirely failed" to consider an important aspect where, admittedly, the FDA carefully considered each aspect of the problem. SMH.

[Dr. Ed 2]

What is the chance SCOTUS will preemptively toss all four trials?

[not guilty]

"What is the chance SCOTUS will preemptively toss all four trials?"

Zilch. The denial of a motion to dismiss is not reviewable on appeal prior to trial.

[bevis the lumberjack]

What is the chance that me, a non-Catholic, will be the next Pope?

[VinniUSMC]

Animal? "Me be Pope! Me be Pope!"

Just identify as the next Pope and the odds will be 100%.

[John F. Carr]

Trump needs five justices to agree that he has a right not to stand trial at all. I see no basis for such a ruling. Actual innocence is not good enough. He would need to identify an immunity from prosecution.

If Trump were sued for ordering a drone strike on Qasem Soleimani then he would have the right not to stand trial and would be entitled to have the case promptly dismissed. The president has absolute immunity for such official acts. If he were criminally charged with running a pedophile ring out of a pizza shop he would have to go to court. Even if it was obviously just a conspiracy theory.

[Brett Bellmore]

Honestly, I think he's screwed, and so are our politics going forward. He's got no real defense against this tactic of spamming somebody with a ridiculous number of charges in diverse (But all politically hostile!) jurisdictions. They don't have to be good cases, individually, for it to work. They could all, individually, be dubious enough cases that no responsible prosecutor would ever bring them, but you're practically certain to have at least one conviction.

There's no way this doesn't get reused against somebody NOT named Donald Trump. Over and over. It's too good a weapon, once it's seen as acceptable to do it.

Just like rape accusations decades old in unspecified places, at unspecified times, it's with us from now on.

[Nige]

'He’s got no real defense'

Poor helpless criminal.

[Frank Drackman]

I know, but Joe's got the Parkinson's, He's Confused!!!!!

[Nelson]

"with a ridiculous number of charges in diverse (But all politically hostile!) jurisdictions"

Florida and Judge Cannon are hostile to Trump in your world?

Also, if he doesn't want to stand trial in certain jurisdictions, he shouldn't break the law there.

[David Nieporent]

What is the chance SCOTUS will preemptively toss all four trials?

The same as the chance of you winning a Nobel Prize. It's literally a thing not possible under the laws of the country or the physical laws of this universe.

[VinniUSMC]

Is that the 82nd Law of Thermodynamics?

[Ridgeway]

Ed wrote his doctoral dissertation on that at UMass-Dartmouth.

[Frank Drackman]

More to the point, what is the chance there will be a person of Non-Color (in ATL and D.C. I believe the term is "Cracker" but I defer to the Reverend Arthur L. Kirkland- Sandusky on that one) on the "Juries of his Peers" that will determine "45"s "Guilt"
and it's been a while, but with Richard Milhouse Penis in the Oval Orifice in 1969, how did Ted Kennedy not get charged with anything (OK, I know, driving off a bridge)????

Frank

[not guilty]

Ted Kennedy's behavior at Chappaquiddick was indefensible, but he did get charged with leaving the scene of an accident. He pled guilty.

[Krayt]

Last night on CNN, they interviewed, their words, a "mafia boss's" lawyer, said client being prosecuted by Giuliani under RICO. The host and the boss waxed joyful about Giuliani being hoisted by his own RICO.

Maybe. But is that really a good look to throw in with?

[Martinned]

You don't think comparing Trump to a mobster is an apt comparison?

[Mr. Bumble]

So how is Trump comparable to a mobster?

[Nige]

Yeah, obviously normal mob bosses can't personally pardon their capos and henchmen.

[Frank Drackman]

You're Forgetting Billy "the Chin(s)" Clinton pardoning his Captain Mark Rich, might want to check your Robot Memory

[bevis the lumberjack]

Comparing Trump to a mobster is being as stupid as Trump is. He’s an imbecilic megalomaniac who has an ego so yuuuuuge that he couldn’t accept losing.

Biden is closer to a mobster than Trump is, and he’s not a mobster either.

[Nige]

Once again, the mountain of sleaze in the Trump administration is equated to a single phrase in a probably-hacked e-mail in a suspiciously-abandoned laptop.

[OtisAH]

You need to finally pick a fucking lane dude. All this ping ponging between MAGA, Greenwald, and Sanders Lite rhetoric is nauseating.

[Frank Drackman]

Be Kind/Gentle Otis(!!! My Man!!!!!!!!!)
Nige-bot tends to get stuck in closed loops until his diodes get all hot and bothered and he goes into emergency mode.

[Sarcastr0]

Yes, what about CNN’s decorum?

Lol they there that away back in the zombie plane days.

[Krayt]

As I pointed out elsewhere, I only saw something like this once before, where Trump killed a terrorist leader, and CNN, in their role as 100% contrarian, ran around gathering interviews of people crying that he was gone.

Sorry, hate on him if you want. Work your journalism to get rid of him. But throwing in with terrorist leaders and mob bosses to git ‘im is going a little too far.

Holding up war hawks like Bolton, and Mr. Gay Treatments Pence, as they turn against him, as neo heroes is just about the right level of extreme for rabid, drooling opposition. These other things are an unseemly bridge too far.

[jb]

Almost everyone that was in the Trump administration is against him now. I don't like Bolton's or Pence's politics at all, but they're part of a LONG list of folks that Trump hired who are now convinced the man should not be President. Under normal circumstances, that would be a pretty big red flag for whether you'd want to put that guy in charge again, but I guess for MAGA folks it's just part of the Deep State conspiracy.

[Sarcastr0]

I’m not hating on Trump at the moment. I’m noting your calls for decorum by CNN are silly if you know CNN. You are just seeking grievance.

[John F. Carr]

I appreciate the irony, but it isn't Giuliani's RICO. Giuliani prosecuted under federal law. Georgia's RICO is more akin to conspiracy to commit a crime. Probably. Ken White's "Serious Trouble" podcast had a guest lawyer talking about courts' refusal to explain what the elements of a state law RICO offense are.

[OtisAH]

One of the only delightful developments of the Turnip age is the revelation that tens of millions of Americans have never seen a gangster movie, watched any mob-related documentaries, read any mob-themed books, or ever even heard of the mob before. Also, euphemisms. Never been exposed to them and never heard one. Wouldn’t recognize it if they had. It’s truly amazing.

[Frank Drackman]

Otis!!!!! ( My Man, I'm your biggest Fan!!!)
I vouch for Grimsrud. Never heard of him. Don't vouch for him.
Are you really Shemp Proudfoot???

Frank

[NvEric]

I expect the illegal Biden Junta to impose Martial Law in 2024, and when that happens one better pick the right side of history. Classic Liberal for Freedom, a concept still empowered by those which never stopped struggling despite many severe and continual efforts to subvert, attack, despise, malign, and disparage it.

The forces of the illegal Biden Junta will not prevail once the Sleeping Tiger is fully awakened.

Current subversion of LAW for enforcing illegalities of the Biden, et alia, regimes will end one way or another by peaceful measures of force applied.

[loki13]

I would recommend putting together a list of your predictions and seeing how many of them turn out to be wrong, but, like a Flat Earther, I am quite positive that your beliefs can't be wrong. Only reality.

[Nige]

What was that big military training op under Obama that was secretly going to be a New World Order takeover? Like that? Why does so much of the utterly stupid shit that conservatives claim to believe get memory-holed so completely?

[David Nieporent]

Jade Helm?

[Nige]

Gesundheit.

[Nige]

(That's the one.)

[OtisAH]

You don’t know what a “junta” is.

[Kazinski]

Martial law no. But he will declare a climate emergency and claim powers which will make people think its martial law.

[Sarcastr0]

By 2024?

[Nige]

By 2024 we may or may not have the army out helping with various climate-related disasters. By 2030 for sure. Maybe that's what he means.

[Kazinski]

Try to keep up:

“President Joe Biden said he has already “practically” declared a climate emergency. But he has yet to actually make a declaration, which would give him a host of new powers to combat climate change as the country faces record-breaking heat and more frequent and intense floods, droughts and wildfires.

“We’ve already done that,” Biden said Wednesday when asked whether he was prepared to declare a national climate emergency during an interview on The Weather Channel.”

https://www.politico.com/news/2023/08/09/biden-climate-emergency-00110486

[Jerry B.]

Anyone here follow the webcomic "Sinfest"?

Sinfest(dot)xyz

[Brett Bellmore]

I'm wondering if something has happened to the author of Three Panel Soul. It's been months since the site has updated, at this point I'm really expecting the page to go down when the domain registration expires.

Which is a shame, because I love this comic.

[bevis the lumberjack]

“I bet there’s no election in 2024”. “The illegal Biden junta will impose Martial Law in 2024”. “If you try Trump there’s gonna be violence”.

Were all these people crazy before Trump came along? Or is he just a Svengali-like person who drives people to insanity?

Yeah, the left has their own whackos, but I can’t comprehend the devotion on the right to such an amoral, selfish, arrogant fool. He’s destroying your party and your reveling in it.

[Bored Lawyer]

Nihilism. In their heart of hearts, they believe the country is lost. This is their way of sticking it to the winners. Like sticking up your middle finger to the terrorists as they kill your family.

[bevis the lumberjack]

I’ve stated a similar thought on here. A huge subset of the population, both here and in Western Europe have been disrupted. The wage gap is a primary symptom of that. The left rails against the wage gap without comprehending that they contributed to it. But not alone. I think it’s the intermediate/long term impact of globalization.

It gave us Brexit. It gave us Trump. It gave us the Canadian truckers. The Dutch farm revolt. More and more people are pushing back against the climate sacrifices that the lower classes (but never the elite) are being expected to bear.

But Trump isn’t a good vehicle for it.

A lot of babbling on the right about a civil war over political difference. Zero chance of that happening because a whole lot of the country doesn’t care about the political crap enough to shoot people over it.

But we delude ourselves if we think we’re immune from another revolution. Here, France, somewhere. It won’t be the red against the blue. It’ll be haves against have nots. The ruled against their masters.

I’m not predicting this as an outcome but it’s certainly in play. The elites would be stunned to think that it could happen but that simply demonstrates how truly out of touch they are. People are angry and the elite ruling class just keeps giving them more of the same.

[Martinned]

It gave us (..) The Dutch farm revolt.

You mean the same "revolt" that's been happening periodically (i.e. whenever anyone suggested reducing farm subsidies) since at least 1971?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M4OhaB5kL8M&t=1s

[bevis the lumberjack]

Keep encouraging fucking over the largest economic demographic group and you’ll earn what you get.

But why care about those folks, right? You’re vastly superior to them.

[Martinned]

1. Farmers aren't a demographic group.
2. There aren't very many of them.
3. In the Netherlands it's incredibly easy to start a populist rightwing party and get 10% or more in the polls or even elections. We've had:
- 1999: Leefbaar Nederland
- 2002: Lijst Pim Fortuyn
- 2006: PVV
- 2016: Forum for Democracy
- 2019: BBB
(And that's just the ones who scored double digits.)

[bevis the lumberjack]

You’re completely ignoring the higher point and getting lost in minutiae. The economic demographic group I referred to wasn’t “farmers”, genius.

Keep defending it, man. One day you may reap what you are sewing.

[Martinned]

Hence my point 3.

[Nelson]

"The economic demographic group I referred to wasn’t “farmers”, genius."

OK, I'll bite. What group are you referring to? People over 70? Lefthanded people? Religious people?

What group of people with a common demographic element are you saying is the "largest" and why would that commonality cause them to want to revolt?

Your four examples have four different, unrelated causes. What do you think ties them (and your mysterious "demographic group") together?

[Brett Bellmore]

"A lot of babbling on the right about a civil war over political difference. Zero chance of that happening because a whole lot of the country doesn’t care about the political crap enough to shoot people over it. "

Plenty enough to give us something similar to the Irish "Troubles", though. Only in a technologically much more fragile society. The fraction of society that has to get violent to really make life shitty is tiny, when you come down to it.

[Nige]

So here we are, contemplating a campaign of blowing up school buses and massacring drag queen story hours... for Trump.

[Brett Bellmore]

I think it's more likely that power lines going into cities would be taken down, actually.

But, yeah, generally speaking if you piss off enough people, bad things happen, and that's regardless of whether you think they should be pissed off.

[grb]

Yep; there's a lot of right-wing rage out there, but here's your problem, Brett: More than 99.99% is completely phony. It's like all those people at a pro-wrestling match, red-faced from cheering & jeering.

Sure they're excited. Sure their little hearts beat a mile-a-minute. But it's fake and everyone knows it. And that's today's Right. It's an entertainment consumer product that delivers bracing excitement.

And that's perfectly good for the ordinary Joe who pops a can of (anything but Bud) to watch Fox New in his boxers. That's perfectly good for someone who slaps his knees over Trump's latest brat-child theatrics. But fake indignation and hobby rage doesn't translate well to revolution. Who'd wage war over CRT or the transsexual menace when everyone knows that's all empty bullshit?

[Brett Bellmore]

Actually, a poll I linked to elsewhere here shows that there's a lot more left-wing rage about than right wing rage. Not that you needed polls to figure that out after years of rioting. After all, the shocking thing about January 6th was mostly the discovery that right wingers could riot, too.

[Sarcastr0]

His point is about the disconnection between talking and acting.

[Nige]

Left-wing rage is usually discounted and dismissed. It's right wing rage that usually needs to be appeased.

[Bob from Ohio]

Left-wing rage gets favorable treatment from prosecutors, right wing rage gets hounded until the ends of the earth.

[Nige]

Yeah, not a single BLM demonstrator was ever arrested and thousands of Jan 6th defendants are still being held without charge.

[Nige]

Funny how that wasn't a factor when you decided to support a man who tried to steal an election.

[apedad]

"It’ll be haves against have nots. The ruled against their masters."

I disagree.

The masses rise up to violence when they have no voice and no opportunity for control of their lives.

Which is why (as I've said often), Trump was a good thing for the long-term survival of our nation.

The Magaroonis used their opportunity to take control and did make some changes (perhaps long-term but never permanent like with the Supreme Court)- GOOD FOR THEM!

It's our flexibility to swing (without going to extremes), with the political winds of the time that makes us a great nation.

[Frank Drackman]

There's alot of erected officials in DC who should be "Swinging" and I'd put that Turtle neck Mitch McConnell at the top of the list.

Frank

[grb]

bevis the lumberjack : “I think it’s the intermediate/long term impact of globalization”

Globalization has been around a long time – even if you restrict yourself to its period as a buzz word. But the worldwide populist craziness is a more recent phenomena. My theory? It’s a delayed reaction to the chaos of the Great Recession. Suddenly assumptions of progress, stability, and the wisdom / integrity of our economic stewards fell to pieces - and the result was worldwide suffering (my own included, so I may be biased).

This also has a historical precedent, albeit at a different scale. The Great Depression was also followed by right-wing populism in countries around the globe. The economic damage was greater, the suffering was worse, the safety net protections were less, and therefore the result was much more toxic and tragic. Instead of Trump, Orban, Erdoğan, Putin & Modi we had Hitler, Mussolini, & Antonescu.

[Martinned]

Bad economic conditions always gives us bad politics. Egalitarianism is easier when the size of the pie is growing each year.

https://stumblingandmumbling.typepad.com/stumbling_and_mumbling/2020/10/the-economic-base-of-culture-wars.html

The more confusing thing is that the US economy is doing really well but Biden's numbers are still in the toilet.

[Frank Drackman]

The even more confusing thing is you consider this current shitty economy "Doing Really Well" Last time I was in the Big Apple, got the hankering for some Arby's, nothing special, just 2 of the Classic Roast Beef sandwiches, friggin $14!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
and checked the price of gasoline lately? double what it was when "45" was in Orifice, and that's after Senescent/Parkinsonian Joe drained 3/4 of the Strategic Petroleum Reserve, and wants to ban all off shore drilling. Where the fuck he thinks oil comes from?

Frank "Kinder/Gentler on Summer Break"

[David Nieporent]

The economy is doing really well. Growth is up, inflation is decreasing rapidly, and unemployment is very low. The people complaining about it are right wing elites trying to pretend otherwise.

[Frank Drackman]

"No Comment"!!!!!

[MoreCurious]

Considering the person you’re responding to, David, do you want to re-think your use of the word “elite?” I can give you some more accurate options if you’d like.

[bevis the lumberjack]

Inflation has been trending down primary because energy has backed off because the market is trying to price in a recession.

Energy has turned now because OPEC+ changed their policy. Inflation ticked back up last month. I wouldn’t do the “great job, Brownie!” thing just yet.

And you too are ignoring the lower end of the middle class. Unless you’re counting then among the right wing elites.

Nobody is thinking about those people. Nobody. Wonder why they’re getting angrier every year……

[Brett Bellmore]

Or maybe the number rigging just got caught up.

[grb]

Conspiracy!

[Sarcastr0]

When inflation goes I pump it’s Biden’s fault. When it goes down, it’s not because of him.

He’d better get with the program and do what you want lest people you just now speak for get angry.

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

this current shitty economy

The economy is strong, particularly with respect to educated, skilled, decent people who are willing to work and have chosen to live in successful, modern, educated communities.

[Frank Drackman]

Yeah, but what about for disgraced former Big 10(11? 12? 13?) Foo-Bawl Coaches???

[bevis the lumberjack]

The US economy is doing well primarily because we’ve been digging out of self imposed pandemic shut downs.

But for the people I’m talking about it’s not doing well at all. Their jobs are all in SE Asia and Mexico. Any gains they’re seeing are being chewed alive by inflation and by government-imposed extra costs for things like energy (and other stuff).

Biden is unpopular because his policies are costing people money - he just imposed another one last month) while at the same time he’s obsessed with forgiving billions in debt for people with masters degrees. He’s giving some lip service to the people I’m talking about, but actions speak louder than words.

Trump is at least screaming about cleaning the rats nest out. He has no clue how do do so, and probably no intent, but it’s the only thing that’s keeping such a broken ridiculous fool close to the game. A competent, decent president who at least admitted the problem and talked about fixing it would wipe the floor with Trump. But that ain’t what we’ve got.

[Bob from Ohio]

"US economy is doing really well"

“Inflation forces US families to spend $709 more a month than two years ago” August 11, 2023 / 11:19 AM / CNN

[Martinned]

Fortunately GDP statistics also come in real terms: https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/GDPC1

[Bob from Ohio]

People care about their personal situation, not GDP stats.

[Martinned]

You're the one who quoted a stat at me. Is there any other way you'd like to talk about the US economy?

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

There is more to America than Can't Keep Up, Ohio.

Much more.

[Martinned]

And here, while I'm on the FRED website, have some unemployment data too: https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/UNRATE

[Nige]

This is where we find out exactly how shallow the right wing concern about wage stagnation really is.

[Frank Drackman]

Enjoy that cake, Marie

[bevis the lumberjack]

Grb - I said “long term”. The problem has had time to grow and fester. For the last decade or so, people have more and more come to feel that they’ve been screwed. And they look around and see that their neighbors have as well. Someone in power needs to figure out and work to change it. Trump has tapped into it somehow but I’m not sure he gets it exactly and he’s way too fucking stupid to change things anyway.

[Sarcastr0]

Never mind the numbers, it’s unsourced anecdotes about feelings that are the true economic measure!

[Nige]

'More and more people are pushing back against the climate sacrifices that the lower classes (but never the elite) are being expected to bear.'

Coincidentally, this so-called pushback entirely benefits the elite, not the lower classes, same with Brexit and Trump, almost as if whatever political and economic forces keep wages low and promoted austerity as the correct response to a global financial crash are also behind Brexit, Trump and climate change denial.

[jb]

It's true that the economy is a mess (structurally) and not serving many Americans well. I think this shows up in several ways:

- As you note, a lot of people have been economically displaced by technology and globalization and we've done a poor job figuring out how to re-integrate them into the economy.
- More generally, though, inequality in the economy has become significantly more pronounced in recent decades. Not only has the gap between the rich and the poor been getting wider, but more problematically the middle class is now being left behind as well. This shows up in trends around both income and wealth.
- At the same time, foundational expenses like housing, education and health care are becoming vastly more expensive so more and more of people's spending goes into these buckets instead of discretionary stuff that might make them feel richer or happier.

I don't think either party has an economic agenda that fully addresses these problems, but honestly progressive wing of the Democratic party has policy ideas that are at least intended to address these problems* whereas both the Republican establishment (whose policy proposals basically deny these problems exist or explicitly make them worse) or Trump's populism (which basically seeks to shift blame as opposed to addressing them) fail to do so. Since Republicans seem able to keep people on Team Red through culture war topics, through this lens Trumpism is perhaps unsurprising: it doesn't really purport to solve the underlying problem, but at least it gives you someone other than the people you voted for to be mad at about it.

* I'll leave for another time discussions of whether those policies would be effective or not.

[Brett Bellmore]

Fat lot of good it does to have proposals that you say will help people, if they don't really. Both parties have THOSE on tap!

One of the rare points of bipartisan agreement in a recent poll was that across the political spectrum, everybody agrees that their party's establishment has been captured by elites who are out for their own benefit, and don't care about the common man.

That's because it's true. Of BOTH parties.

[Sarcastr0]

Populism isn’t a principle, it’s a tactic. You can use it to justify anything.

[jb]

Fat lot of good it does to have proposals that you say will help people, if they don’t really. Both parties have THOSE on tap!

No, that's my whole point. Republicans don't really have any proposals to address the problems I laid out. Cutting taxes doesn't attempt to solve any of the problems that I listed, not even notionally. (The argument is that it's good for "job creation", but we're not lacking jobs we're lacking fairness in income distribution even amongst those who are employed.) None of the culture war nonsense that is the primary thing Republicans are legislating these days solves any of those problems.

Being generous, Trump's anti-immigration/globalization and Republicans' pro-fossil-fuel agendas can be read as trying to avoid job displacement, but there doesn't seem to be any attempt to get at any of the other problems. Sure, let's complain about Obamacare, but there's no alternative plan and meanwhile the policy is actually to make healthcare less and less affordable by kicking people off of Medicaid. Sure, we hate student loan reform, but what are we going to do about education prices instead? Tell people they don't need to go to college, I guess, but mostly cut funding to public colleges and universities, which actually makes the problem worse.

Seriously, show me someone on the right who is even attempting to address the economic malaise that Americans are facing. At least Bernie Sanders has some sort of plan; at least Wes Moore can tell you what he's trying to do about getting people to work and paid fairly. Ron DeSantis is just going to tell you about how bad woke Democrats are and try to chase jobs out of the state.

[Nige]

Does nobody else remember the ‘joke’ going around post 9-11 when some news outlets had the temerity the mildly question to drumbeat to war? ‘One tree, one rope, one journalist, some assembly required.’ They’ve always been like this. Oh, and it turned out they faked the evidence that justified the invasion of Iraq, and tortured people, and nobody seems to remember these as the obscene crimes they were. This was actually worse than anything Trump has done, save maybe betraying the Kurds, and the mess at the border, and even then he just made a bad thing a lot worse, as is his wont, so being amoral, selfish and arrogant is on-brand, it’s just the personal narcissistic sleaze that got amped up and was mostly directed inwards.

[Frank Drackman]

Well it was enough evidence to convince Hillary Rodman, Parkinsonian Joe, and John "Lurch" Kerry to vote for the Wah. Are you smarter than them?

[jb]

People on the right talk about Trump Derangement Syndrome and it's true that a lot of reactions on the left are extra-extreme when it comes to Trump.

But TDS on the right is way worse. People twist themselves in knots around both logic and values to support this guy, and it seems to mean that more and more deranged positions need to become mainstream in conservative circles as a result.

[Bored Lawyer]

Let me make a suggestion. We now have two weekly open threads. Both tend to be dominated by politics and the latest happenings of Trump, and to a lesser extent, Biden. Many of the comments are asinine. And it is hard to wade through all that to get to any other serious discussion.
My suggestion: One day a week can be devoted to the Trump/Biden circus, the other no discussion of that. Those who are interested can read either one or both.
Comments?

[Mr. Bumble]

Who would police it? Even the non open threads devolve into politics.

[Moderation4ever]

Let's be libertarian about this and say we self-police. I suggest we agree on a non-Trump/Biden day first. Then agree that we will not respond to comments made on Trump or Biden on the non-Trump/Biden day. I suspect those violating the rule will soon fall in line.

I suggest Monday for a Trump Biden free open thread.

[Mr. Bumble]

Kind of goes against the idea of an open thread but nothing to stop you from not commenting about Trump/Biden and ignoring those who do.

[Nige]

We're a community, we can do stuff through consensus.

[Frank Drackman]

Fuck Communities, Fuck Consensus (Consensually of course)
Consensus in Germany was to exterminate Jews. Pretty much what it would be in other Anti Semite centers, like Terror-Ann, Ka-bull, Damn-ass-kiss, Cairo, and Detroit.

Frank

[Bob from Ohio]

" I suspect those violating the rule will soon fall in line."

Very libertarian.

The concept goes against the whole "open thread" discussion. So I don't agree even though I almost never start a comment tree on the subject. People can ignore comments if they wish, diktats are wrong.

Don't worry not guilty, if, as usual, you want to wait all night until EV posts so you can be first, you can count on me for a response comment.

[Moderation4ever]

Perhaps you and I have a different idea of libertarianism. My understanding is that there should be fewer rules and that social convention can be maintained by people exercising their rights of free association. Government should not tell a person they must bake wedding cakes for gay weddings, but instead the market will dictate and the non-gay wedding cake person will have a smaller customer base. If they cannot survive with that smaller base, they will leave the market place.

Now if you sick of Trump postings dominating two threads a week you can choose to not respond to posts on one or both days and also encourage others to do the same. If responses are important to the posters they will chose to post on days when people are responding. No rules are made but the community drives the conventions for posting.

[loki13]

I second this comment.

I would love to see a Trump-free comment zone.

[Mr. Bumble]

I suppose that a start would be self-policing by not responding to comments about Trump/Biden/politics.

[loki13]

Or, you know, self-policing by not making them.

I have a decent number of the crazies on mute, anyway.

[Frank Drackman]

Well THAT’s gonna leave a mark. and pretty rich wanting a “Trump-Free Zone” when the Clinton Narcotics Network, PMS-NBC/National Pubic Radio/Pubic Propaganda Broadcasting System, Clinton Broadcasting System can’t go 20 seconds without saying “Trump”.

Frank

[Sarcastr0]

It’s worth a try. To implement would require some pretty strong group condemnation of those who ignore the request; I’m not sure we have the group solidarity for that.

But I do think it’d be something to attempt. If nothing else, it would be interesting.

[Bob from Ohio]

"group condemnation "

Oh noes, not that.

[Commenter_XY]

I don't think you need group condemnation at all. Simply do not respond to the comment. If you don't provide reinforcement (positive or negative), the behavior will stop.

[Sarcastr0]

Too ,Amy free riders for that to work imo

[Magister]

Maybe we could start a fundraiser to get Sarcastr0 a better keyboard or improved dictation software or a proofreader or something to reduce typos in his posts. My eyes struggle enough as it is.

[Sarcastr0]

I’m on vacation this week and tablet posting.

[Magister]

You might enjoy your vacation more by staying away from here...

[Sarcastr0]

Lol. If posting here stops being fun, I’ll leave. Everyone should do the same!

[Magister]

If posting here is more fun than whatever I will do on my next vacation, I should just cancel that vacation.

[bevis the lumberjack]

Fine with me. I’ve long been exhausted by Trump-related stuff anyway. Not his crimes, the whole shit show. I’ve got severe TFS.

But I’ve used the mute function liberally so I don’t have to read through most of the asinine stuff.

[Alpheus W Drinkwater]

I think my record so far is ten consecutive comments and nested comments, all muted.

[Martinned]

I periodically throw in some non-Trump prompts to see if it might spark an interesting conversation, but haven't necessarily opted out of the Trump stuff.

(The boundaries are quite tricky. Basically any defence of the rule of law is already an attack on Trump, or can be. So is talking about Aristotle an attack on Trump?)

[bevis the lumberjack]

Trump sucks up all the air in the room.

[Frank Drackman]

Certainly not the case with Parkinsonian Joe, until his "No Comment" remark earlier this week, wasn't sure he was still alive, can't wait to see him propped up like Weekend at Bernie's next fall.

[Martinned]

Tbf, it is usually when someone tries to break the law in new and unusual ways that interesting legal issues come up. It's basically like the Dutch king William III (r. 1849-1890), who didn't much like being a constitutional monarch, and therefore did whatever he could to push through his will. Pretty much every rule of unwritten Dutch constitutional law about the relationship between the government and parliament dates from that time. If you're trying to think through all the things the government might do, and all the things parliament might do in response, there's usually a precedent from the time of William III. (Sometimes quite amusing too.)

[Bob from Ohio]

"One day a week can be devoted to the Trump/Biden circus, the other no discussion of that."

Not guilty hardest hit

[Nige]

A palpable hit, in fairness.

[Alpheus W Drinkwater]

Bored Lawyer, that is a fantastic idea! It would require active moderation, though, and I'm not sure who would have time or inclination to do that.

[Mr. Bumble]

Self moderate.

[jb]

This is a good idea, hopefully achievable through self-regulation. Since the Thursday thread has been around longer, I'd propose that it's the place for the inevitable Trump/Biden discussions and Monday stays reserved for other topics. But I don't have strong preference for which is which.

[David Nieporent]

One day a week can be devoted to the Trump/Biden circus, the other no discussion of that.

There’s too much news coming out too frequently for that. If Trump is indicted on a Tuesday, waiting until the following Monday to talk about it is rather 19th century.

(Replace T/M with F/Th if Thursday is the designated Trump day.)

[Kazinski]

If you don't like the topics people are.posting on, then post your own topic.

[Gasman]

A Godwin's law for Trump/Biden comments would apply just as certainly.
But worth a try

[loki13]

Thought for the day-

There will be a time when people quote Judge Ho's writing with the same derision that we now talk about "The Trees Have Standing."

And that time is ... well, it's already come. "Hey, look at me! I got me an aesthetic injury!"

No? How about "My conscience is hurt, and that's an irreparable harm. Ouch, my hurtin' conscience! Because I might not get paid, and not getting paid is an irreparable injury!"

[SimonP]

Ho strikes me as someone nursing myriad grievances and relishing the opportunity to turn case law into a weapon against those he believes responsible for those grievances. It's no wonder Josh is such a fan.

[loki13]

I think that this is exactly right.

That said, what makes Ho so particularly terrible (and he is particularly terrible) isn't the result-oriented jurisprudence; it's that he regularly trashes process and settled issues, inventing out of whole-cloth new concepts to get to his desired results.

As I've always said- bad results can happen. But how the bad results happen matter. Judges that follow regular process and apply regular law and reach a "bad" (or "incorrect") result? That sucks, but it's fine. When a judge starts screwing with basic concepts in the law to reach their desired bogus result, however, it has spillover effects, because then that screwy reasoning will get reused in other contexts with unpredictable results.

[Kazinski]

What's a good case as an example?

[loki13]

There's quite a few, but the idea that there is irreparable harm in Sambrano is the one that still takes the cake AFAIC.

[Kazinski]

Well your mileage could definitely vary based on how you view this question:
"The second form of harm flows from United’s decision to coerce the plaintiffs into violating their religious convictions; that harm and that harm alone is irreparable and supports a preliminary injunction.
This court and the Supreme Court have held that “[t]he loss of First Amendment freedoms, for even minimal periods of time, unquestionably constitutes irreparable injury.”

So if you are of the view there is no irreparable harm because the employee could just submit to the unpaid leave, and be compensated later. Or recognize that some people will be coerced into taking the vaccine and feel they had to compromise their convictions and were harmed irreparably.

[loki13]

In order to understand why this is so profoundly wrong, you actually have to understand Title VII law, and the fact that there are 50 years of precedents (as well as actual statutory language!) regarding the issue.

The basic point is quite simple- both because of the statutory language, WHICH ENDS THE ANALYSIS, and also because this is a standard employment case, wherein you can always be compensated with money (that's the whole point), this is completely, 100% wrong. That's why the injunction opinion, below, is unpublished. Read the dissent from the lower panel opinion by Smith where he discusses, correctly, just how wrong it is.

There is no irreparable harm because, if they are correct on the merits, they refuse the vaccine and they get their money later- that's, quite literally, the definition of reparable harm.

Yes. As people have long noted- the coercive power of money can be real. But guess what? In terms of the law, it can never, ever, ever be irreparable harm. This is a wholly-invented legal theory.

[loki13]

Put more succinctly, this is the type of reasoning that would get someone an F in any remedies class, or any employment law class. And rightly so.

And in any reasonable circuit, this would have been easily rejected. In fact, it's hard to imagine a rational practitioner with experience even making the motion, knowing that it is likely sanctionable.

(But since the litigants were represented by a group that specifically was advancing an ideological cause in the 5th, we get this, instead.)

[Martinned]

To update on something I mentioned the other day, the Polish parliament has now adopted the necessary legislation to hold a referendum to coincide with the parliamentary election on 15 October.

Reuters, ever diplomatic, summarises the referendum questions as:

Poles will vote on whether they support the privatization of state companies; a higher retirement age; the dismantling of the fence on the border with Belarus and accepting thousands of migrants under a migration deal with the European Union.

https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/polish-parliament-passes-law-allowing-hold-referendum-election-day-2023-08-16/

[Martinned]

The actual legislation is here: https://orka.sejm.gov.pl/Druki9ka.nsf/0/21D7B33F7479E181C1258A0C00620456/%24File/3586.pdf

Google Translate translates the questions as:
1. Do you support the sale of state assets to foreign entities, leading to the loss of control by Polish women and men over strategic sectors of the economy?
2. Do you support raising the retirement age, including restoring the retirement age to 67 for men and women?
3. Do you support the removal of the barrier on the border between the Republic of Poland and the Republic of Belarus?
4. Do you support the acceptance of thousands of illegal immigrants from the Middle East and Africa, according to the forced relocation mechanism imposed by the European bureaucracy?

[Nige]

Jesus, I can only imagine what the campaigning around that must be like. It's like a Polish Brexit.

[Martinned]

Exactly, they're accusing opposition leader Donald Tusk (former prime minister, former chairman of the European Council) of wanting to surrender Poland to EU bureaucrats. Add in some racism, some conspiracy theories, and you're cooked. That whole question 1 is about linking Tusk to selling Polish assets to evil Germans.

It's just the EU exit they don't want, because they like our money and they're (understandably) paranoid about Russia.

[Bob from Ohio]

"they’re (understandably) paranoid about Russia."

Pray tell what the EU would do about a Russian invasion?

Frown? Send a "strongly worded letter"? Send the non-existent EU army?

[Martinned]

Poland exiting the EU wouldn’t do wonders for its ability to persuade EU Member States to station military units on its territory.

https://www.nato.int/cps/en/natohq/topics_136388.htm

[John F. Carr]

In the EU, what happens if Duda pulls a DeSantis and puts thousands of immigrants on a train to Berlin so Germans can see what the "let the border states suffer" policy means to border states?

[Martinned]

The Germans always have the option of stopping them at the border. That's what various member states did the last time there was an immigration crisis.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2015_European_migrant_crisis#Chaotic_border_closures_in_central_Europe

Whether that's in fact what Germany would do is a different question. There aren't that many actual refugees in Poland, so even if Poland grabs every refugee they've got that still wouldn't put much of a dent in the German asylum system. And Germany is quite keen to avoid looking like the bad guy in Eastern Europe. There are historic sensitivities there that the German government is well aware of.

[Kazinski]

Someone already did that to Germany a few years ago.

It was Angela Merkel.

[IAdmitIAmCrazy]

The problem with Poland in the migration crisis is that it is the one that doesn't want to do its part of burden sharing with the border states — "let the border states suffer". You will be surprised how much bad blood that creates with the otherwise pretty aligned right-wing government of Italy, for example.
The European Union with its common border program is obliged by international law to properly process asylum seekers once they reach the common territory. Greece, Spain and Italy are overburdened with the Dublin rule that stipulates the asylum seekers have to be processed at the point of entry, quite convenient for the NIMBY crowd.

[Commenter_XY]

Google Translate doesn't communicate the sense of translations particularly well, from what I have seen.

[Josh R]

Testing.

[apedad]

‘She sits on her couch daily watching the news while drinking too many beers’: Trump supporter accused of racist threats against Jan. 6 judge is locked up ahead of trial

Abigail Jo Shry, 43, of Alvin, Texas, has a bond hearing set in the Southern District of Texas for Sept. 13, but in the meantime she remains detained ahead of trial for allegedly sending a threatening voicemail to (District Judge Tany) Chutkan that called the judge a “slave n—.”

Chutkan, a Barack Obama appointee, received the threatening call in her chambers on the night of Aug. 5.

“Hey you stupid slave n—,” the call began. The defendant also allegedly said, You are in our sights, we want to kill you,” “We want to kill Sheila Jackson Lee,” “If Trump doesn’t get elected in 2024, we are coming to kill you, so tread lightly, b—,” and “You will be targeted personally, publicly, your family, all of it.”

“Mr. Shry (Defendent's father), believes that Defendant is a non-violent alcoholic. He testified that she sits on her couch daily watching the news while drinking too many beers. She then becomes agitated by the news and starts calling people and threatening them,” the court recounted Mark Shry’s testimony.

https://lawandcrime.com/high-profile/she-sits-on-her-couch-daily-watching-the-news-while-drinking-too-many-beers-trump-supporter-accused-of-racist-threats-against-jan-6-judge-is-locked-up-ahead-of-trial/

I wish the Magites would NOT meet our expectations of them.

[loki13]

Let's see if any of the usual commenters are absent for a while ...

Just kidding. Kind of.

[Estragon]

You laugh, but I think that’s what happened to Jimmy the Dane

[Frank Drackman]

"Stupid Slave Nigger"???
Obviously Jesse Smollett on a bender.
Love the "Hate Crimes" where they can't even spell "Nigger" correctly or spray paint a backwards Swastika.

Frank

[apedad]

That's what you get from home schooling in Tennessippi.

[Frank Drackman]

That where you went? explains a lot.

[BravoCharlieDelta]

Maybe 1000s of us can go Burn Loot and Murder for the entire summer?

That would be pretty sweet.

[apedad]

That's so 2020.

You got anything new?

[Michael P]

You should let Chicago, San Francisco, and other cities know that the burning, looting and murdering has been called off. They haven't noticed.

[Sarcastr0]

How much if that do you think is going on in those cities? The right is conjuring blasted hellscapes, while the numbers on violent crime per capita remain not even in the top 10 in America.

[OtisAH]

You’re a loser and a coward and most likely penniless. And although you probably have all the time in the world, those first three factors are tough to overcome.

[Frank Drackman]

Breaking News!
"Kootenai County Idaho District Attorney Stanley Mortensen announces a Grand Jury has indicted President Biden for 12 counts of First Degree Murder in the Afghanistan Evacuation debacle. First Degree Murder is punishable by Lethal Injection with Firing Squad as a back up if Lethal Injection medications are not available. "

Could happen, more evidence to support it than the Bullshit "45"'s charged with.

Frank

[IAdmitIAmCrazy]

Obviously, it is a stunt. Like it or not, it is a case of absolute immunity conferred to a president when exercising his however erroneously or negligently used executive powers.

[Ben_]

Breaking news can be wrong, but it looks like public safety took a back seat to ideology in Maui:
https://www.zerohedge.com/political/woke-hawaiian-official-stalled-release-revered-water-until-it-was-too-late-save-maui

We see similar choices from leftists and progressives all the time. Americans' lives are always low priority.

[BravoCharlieDelta]

That Democrat is the head of Obama's OFA in Hawaii.

He was just seeking Water Justice and making sure we had Sacred Water Equity.

That's more important to Democrats than 100s of children being burned alive in their homes. At least now the Democrat elites can get some really nice ocean front property for next to nothing.

Good news all around. Justice, Equity, and Elites benefiting. The perfect Democrat outcome.

[Martinned]

Now do Covid measures.

[Ben_]

Weird change of subject, but ...

All the Covid measures put Americans' lives last. Instead of protecting 90-year-olds and letting young people live their lives, Democrats sent sick people to spread Covid to nursing home residents and stole a year from the lives of young people who otherwise faced very low risk.

And then everyone got Covid eventually anyway, so stealing a year of young peoples' lives only changed the day on the calendar when someone got Covid. It didn't prevent anything.

[Martinned]

I was going to talk to you about churches that insisted on their god-given right to put people's lives at risk, but I can see now that that conversation was never going to happen. Have a nice day now!

[Ben_]

There are no government churches. Only leftist pseudo-religions like climate change and intersectional-ism are allowed in government.

Climate religion puts humanity last.

BLM/equity/et. al. puts the majority of people last in order to exalt small minorities of designated first-class people.

[Martinned]

O wow, you're really going full-on for all the crazy there.

[Frank Drackman]

You're right, I remember the mobs of Gun Toting Mormons/Baptists/Methodists forcing peoples to go to Church. Seriously, I was wondering what happened to Trig Palin, how's Mama Bear???

[apedad]

I get your /sarc and you're right - no one is forcing a person to go to church.

Those Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints (FLDS Church), are a bit touchy about leaving them once you're in though.

[BravoCharlieDelta]

Hey remember when all those Public health experts said massive protests for black trans lives weren't a pandemic risk for COVID, while also holding that protests against COVID policies and going to church was a pandemic risk for COVID?

lol

[Ben_]

They remember. They just don’t think there’s anything wrong with lying to the public: deceit is a virtue if it works.

[David Nieporent]

And then everyone got Covid eventually anyway, so stealing a year of young peoples’ lives only changed the day on the calendar when someone got Covid. It didn’t prevent anything.

The many ways in which this is stupid are myriad. It mattered a great deal whether someone got Delta in late 2020 or Omicron in 2023.

[Ben_]

Not for people under 30.

[Nige]

For everyone, not least because people under thirty could spread it to people over thirty.

[Commenter_XY]

Was the mortality rate different for young people for Delta and Omnicron, David? I am going to define young people as under 25.

Or were you thinking something different, entirely other than mortality?

[Ben_]

Even if there were small differences, it doesn’t justify the actions. Small numbers of young people also die from the flu. But government doesn’t steal a year of everyone’s life to change very small numbers into even smaller numbers.

[Nige]

You were just happy to steal the entire lifetimes of millions of people and leave millions more disabled because a national response to a crisis is now something you are ideologically opposed to, so at the outset of the crisis you deny there’s a crisis, during the crisis you undermine the response to the crisis, after the crisis you claim the response you sabotaged was ineffective.

[VinniUSMC]

Nice emoting. I'm sure there's a safe space somewhere that you can go cry in.

[Nige]

Cold lazy cynicism is so effective in crisis management.

[Kazinski]

Nige misses covid.

But its gone.

[Nige]

Except it isn't.

[Sarcastr0]

Why are you specifying young people? What artificial metric for success is that? Ben saying some nonsense doesn’t mean you need to pick it up.

[Commenter_XY]

Young people were under discussion. Mortality rate seems like a good objective measure. I am asking about it. I am trying to understand the difference between Delta and Omnicron that David is making.

[Sarcastr0]

It’s not a useful metric for discussion of the cost benefit of what measures were taken.

Ben tailored his topic artificially because he doesn’t care about useful conversation.

[Nige]

‘All the Covid measures put Americans’ lives last’

Trump’s covid measures. Sounds right. Except for the vaccine. Got to give him that one.

[Frank Drackman]

Nige-bot briefly obtains self awareness, spills Starbucks Frappucchino on Keyboard and loses it.

[Nige]

'Breaking news can be wrong,'

There's someone stung by his sources a few times too many.

[Ben_]

Non-Democrats can learn from things that happen.

If I was a Democrat, I would just make up a story about what I thought happened and tell that. No sources needed. I’d say climate change caused the fire and the water couldn’t be used because QAnon (or Trump, or oil companies, or Tucker, or whichever other bogeyman) was standing on the hose. If only more Americans could be censored, then Russian misinformation wouldn’t have kept the water turned off.

[Nige]

Yes, we know you'd make up stories no matter who you support, but clearly Republican is a better fit. You'd even be right about climate change, but you THINK it's a lie, so obviously it's accidental.

[Martinned]

Speaking of Poland, it's creating quite a challenge for the enforcement of EU law.

Because the EU is not some evil tyrrany, and doesn't have an army, the enforcement of EU law has so far gone as follows, as envisaged in the Treaties:
- The Commission writes Poland a letter, e.g. about the Turów coal mine, which is right across the border from Germany and Czechia.
- The Commission takes Poland to Court. That would be the European Court of Justice in Luxembourg.
- The ECJ finds that Poland failed to comply with EU law in some way, and makes a declaration to that effect.
- Crickets
- The Commission takes Poland to Court again, and ask for a daily fine under art. 260 TFEU.
- The ECJ finds that Poland failed to comply with its previous judgment, and imposes a periodic penalty payment of some sort. (E.g. €500k per day in the Turów mine case.)

But the Treaties are more vague about what supposed to happen when Poland refuses to pay that fine.

Secondary EU law provides the obvious solution: The Commission can withhold it from money that would otherwise be payable to Poland. And that's what the Commission has done. So now Poland has brought an action for annulment against the Commission (and the Parliament, for some reason), arguing that the Commission acted unlawfully in doing so.

That's quite a puzzle, even if there is very little chance that Poland will win.

[Martinned]

By the way, this is a convenient list of the Rule of Law cases. The various Poland v. Commission cases are at the bottom: https://euruleoflaw.eu/rule-of-law/rule-of-law-dashboard-overview/polish-cases-cjeu-ecthr/

[Kazinski]

Poland seems to have a very similar problem to one we had over here:

“He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harass our people and eat out their substance.”

“He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation:”
"For imposing Taxes on us without our Consent"
"For taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws and altering fundamentally the Forms of our Governments"

"For suspending our own Legislatures, and declaring themselves invested with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever."

https://www.mountvernon.org/education/primary-source-collections/primary-source-collections/article/the-declaration-of-independence-july-4-1776/

[Martinned]

You know that "no taxation without representation" thing? Well, Poland has representation with only negligible taxation.

Here is a list of Polish members of the European Parliament.

Law and Justice (ECR):
Adam Bielan
Joachim Brudziński
Richard Czarnecki
Anna Fotyga
Patryk Jaki
Krzysztof Jurgiel
Karol Karski
Beata Kempa
Izabela Kloc
Joanna Kopcińska
Zdzisław Krasnodębski
Elżbieta Kruk
Zbigniew Kuźmiuk
Ryszard Legutko
Beata Mazurek
Andżelika Możdżanowska
Tomasz Poręba
Elżbieta Rafalska
Bogdan Rzońca
Jacek Saryusz-Wolski
Beata Szydło
Grzegorz Tobiszowski
Witold Waszczykowski
Jadwiga Wiśniewska
Anna Zalewska
Kosma Złotowski
Dominik Tarczyński

Civic Platform (EPP):
Magdalena Adamowicz
Bartosz Arłukowicz
Jerzy Buzek
Jarosław Duda
Tomasz Frankowski
Andrzej Halicki
Danuta Hübner
Ewa Kopacz
Janusz Lewandowski
Elżbieta Łukacijewska
Janina Ochojska
Jan Olbrycht
Radosław Sikorski

Democratic Left Alliance (S&D):
Robert Biedroń
Łukasz Kohut
Marek Balt
Marek Belka
Włodzimierz Cimoszewicz
Bogusław Liberadzki
Leszek Miller

Polish People's Party (EPP):
Krzysztof Hetman
Adam Jarubas
Jarosław Kalinowski

Poland 2050 (RE):
Róża von Thun und Hohenstein

The Greens (Greens/EFA):
Sylwia Spurek

If you think that Poland is somehow tyranised by the EU, then so is Texas.

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

THE VOLOKH CONSPIRACY

This white, male, conservative
blog has operated for

ZERO (0)

days without publishing
a vile racial slur; it has
published racial slurs on
at least

TWENTY-SEVEN (27)

different occasions (so far)
during 2023 (that’s 27 different
discussions, not 27 racial slurs;
many of those discussions
featured multiple racial slurs).

This assessment does not address
the incessant, disgusting stream of
gay-bashing, misogynist, antisemitic,
Islamophobic, and immigrant-hating
slurs and other bigoted content
presented daily at this conservative
blog, which is presented by members
of the Federalist Society for
Law and Public Policy Studies.

Amid this ugly right-wing intolerance and stale conservative thinking, here is something worthwhile.

(This one is good, too.)

[Vandalia]

The fact that you spend all of your time here complaining about others, rather than actually doing something to serve the community, is all we need to know about you.

Why aren't you at the local school teaching? Why aren't you working at the food pantry? Why aren't you taking care of kids so their parents don't have to pay exorbitant child care fees?

Why aren't you out on the streets of Oakland rounding up criminals so these hard working people can feel safe? So the elderly can actually come out of their homes and get barely a few minutes of sleep every night since they are so afraid?

You spend all your time in your luxury apartment worrying about "slurs", while paying your staff minimum wage, and not carrying about those - including the unborn - that are out their dying.

You really have issues man.

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

The fact that you spend all of your time here complaining about others, rather than actually doing something to serve the community, is all we need to know about you.

Why should Prof. Volokh care what you think about what he does with his time?

Carry on, clinger.

[Frank Drackman]

In Coach Sandusky's, I mean "The Reverend" Sandusky's defense it's not like he can just "Go out in the Community" whenever he likes (thank J-hey) and especially not at a School/Taking care of kids, and I don't believe https://www.cor.pa.gov/Facilities/StatePrisons/Pages/Greene.aspx
qualified as a "Luxury Apartment"
Frank

[Martinned]

Also not Trump and potentially of interest to a website full of full-blood libertarians: The German Cabinet has agreed to legalise possession of cannabis.

https://www.politico.eu/article/germany-bundestag-cabinet-approves-liberalization-of-cannabis-rules

That leaves the War on Drugs mostly something for France.

(No idea how I'd characterise the UK position. Everything is illegal here, but enforcing the drug laws isn't exactly a top priority.)

[Michael P]

Whatever happened to the old states of affairs?

In Germany everything that is not allowed is forbidden;
in England everything is allowed that is not forbidden;
in Russia everything is allowed that is forbidden.

(And some extend it to say that in France, everything is allowed, even if it is forbidden.)

[Martinned]

Germany almost got taken over by the Green party.

[Kazinski]

They were close but as often happens the more power they got the less people like the results:

"BERLIN, May 16 (Reuters) - A slide in support for Germany's Greens, a junior partner in Olaf Scholz's coalition, could force the party to consider scaling back its climate ambitions as voters fret over their financial and social cost.

Support for the Greens slumped by a third to 12% in the state of Bremen on Sunday compared with the last election in 2019, according to projected results. The vote reflected a drop in support at a federal level too, to around 15% in opinion polls from a peak of 23-24% last year."

https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/germanys-greens-lose-appeal-voters-fear-cost-policies-2023-05-16/

Losing a third of their support will take them from where they could lead a ruling coalition, to a junior party in opposition.

Looks like Germany is in or headed for a.recession too, which can plausibly be blamed on green energy policies.

[The Margrave of Azilia]

[joke confusing Bremen with Hamelin deleted]

[Martinned]

Yes. Voters like them better when they don't do the dirty work of compromising with the FDP. (FDP voters, on the other hand, are unhappy when their party joins a coalition like this, but subsequently reward them for playing dirty.)

[Frank Drackman]

Green Party (why are they all Ex College Professors and Lesbian women wearing sensible shoes?) is even more Fascistic than the “AFD” (Alternative For Germany) Party, that the Marxist Stream Media keeps representing as the second coming of Alfred Rosenberg, when they’re more like Mitt Romeney without the funny secret undergarments. Stay in the EU! Protect the Border! Learn German! OMG it's literally like they just built a new Treblinka

Frank

[Frank Drackman]

If a Englishman gets "Meth Mouth" how would you know?

[Vandalia]

So about the story about the raid on the newspaper in Kansas:

Why should newspapers and reporters have rights that do not exist for everyone else; and that do not exist under any other part of the First Amendment?

So why don't churches and other religious communities have the same blanket immunity from search warrants and investigations? Investigating the finances of a church, or going through their personal records to find if they have done criminal background checks (see the many state attorney general investigations) provides at least an equal burden on their First Amendment rights?

Why was the federal government able to obtain search warrants and investigate the Teamsters back under Jimmy Hoffa (and further on)? Again, this would seem to have the potential to interfere with their right to assemble and petition the government. As the government's investigation and prosecution certainly did.

It would seem the Marion County search warrants and investigations can be criticized standing alone.

However, why do newspapers and reporters have blanket immunity from criminal investigation that does not exist for priests, rabbis, imams, union organizers, etc.?

[David Nieporent]

Newspapers and reporters do not have blanket immunity from criminal investigation. Who told you that?

[Vandalia]

See the response to the director of the Kansas Bureau of Investigations comment, “newspapers are not above the law.” In the Kansas City Star article, on the comments,

“Marion, a town of fewer than 2,000 people north of Wichita, was embroiled in controversy after its entire five-officer police force, along with two sheriff’s deputies, executed a search warrant at the Marion County Record — sparking criticism from First Amendment advocates who said it violated federal law that protects journalists from searches and seizures.”

Read more at: https://www.kansascity.com/news/state/kansas/article278222757.html#storylink=cpy

This is particularly true since while there is apparently federal law limiting severely limiting the ability of law enforcement at all levels to investigate reporters and media organizations, the same does not apply to churches, for example.

There is no strict protection for the priest/minister -penitent privilege, and jails routinely record such conversations and use them as evidence. Or use search warrants to determine who is talking with their minister and about what.

[loki13]

"There is no strict protection for the priest/minister -penitent privilege, and jails routinely record such conversations and use them as evidence. Or use search warrants to determine who is talking with their minister and about what."

It took me approximately two seconds on google to learn that Kansas, of course, protects priest/penitent communications through privilege. Kan. Stat. sec. 60-429.

[Vandalia]

Yes, but that only applies to evidence in a court proceeding.

It does not apply to other types of non-criminal investigations, there is also nothing that would prevent law enforcement from obtaining a search warrant to obtain the information from other sources, e.g., an app that is used to translate a confession. Nor would it apply to other related materials, such as a calendar that says who is coming for confession, as it does for the "reporter's privilege."

An example is the case of Conan Wayne Hale. While the 9th Circuit did rule the recorded "confession" could not be used at trial, they did not order the underlying case dismissed with prejudice after the prosecution claimed to the media that he "confessed" in both senses of the word. So the prosecution was still able to use the contents of the "confession" to poison the jury pool, even if it was not admitted at trial.

[loki13]

Yes, so what you're saying is that penitent-priest gets a level of protection just like, oh, attorney-client. And you have to use other ways to get the same information.

Shocker!

What, you want some kind of blanket "get out of jail free" card for all religious institutions? That's ... well, that's something!

[Kazinski]

There is no federal law that gives special protection to journalists from searches and seizures.

Advocates claim lots of things. Kansas does have a press shield law of its own though.

[Absaroka]

No law, but lotsa DOJ special handling. Also...

[Absaroka]

...these more recent restrictions.

[Kazinski]

Yeah but those are voluntary restrictions the DOJ is imposing on itself.

I'm speaking specifically of this claim from the article:
"sparking criticism from First Amendment advocates who said it violated federal law that protects journalists from searches and seizures.”

And Vandalia relying on that assertion: "while there is apparently federal law limiting severely limiting the ability of law enforcement at all levels to investigate reporters and media organizations,"

Certainly there is lots of law that severely limits law enforcement from investigating journalists for 1st amendment protected activity, but those protections also apply to churches too, as the FBI recently acknowledged belatedly.

[grb]

Marion Police Chief Gideon Cody himself (defensively) explained the distinction :

“Speaking in generalities, the federal Privacy Protection Act, 42 U.S.C. §§ 2000aa-2000aa-12, does protect journalists from most searches of newsrooms by federal and state law enforcement officials. It is true that in most cases, it requires police to use subpoenas, rather than search warrants, to search the premises of journalists unless they themselves are suspects in the offense that is the subject of the search.”

Chief Cody went on to say that protection didn’t apply because the newspaper was involved in the criminal act. To this non-lawyer’s eye, that seems pretty excessive about a news story the paper didn’t run and took to the authorities because of their own concerns about its sourcing.

So apparently there are special protections. Of course in this forum full of lawyers there are people more able than me to address that. I’m just a humble architect (if such a thing exists)…

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

However, why do newspapers and reporters have blanket immunity from criminal investigation that does not exist for priests, rabbis, imams, union organizers, etc.?

You sound uninformed, disaffected, superstitious, obsolete, cranky, and stupid.

The Volokh Conspiracy welcomes you!

[Vandalia]

And you sound like another spoiled, rich kid, who has never done a day’s work in his life; let alone actually lifted a finger to help someone. But then again, since you have obviously come to the point where you have recognized your life is a failure, spending literally all-day, every-day here is probably preferable to facing that sad reality.

I will pray for you.

So let’s compare notes: Today I visited 17 people in the hospital, conducted one funeral, consoled one family who had a kid diagnosed with cancer, and worked two hours at the St Vincent de Paul store.

What have you done today to better the world?

Arthur, I know it must be really hard to acknowledge that your entire, sad, life is based around trolling on online message boards. But owning that is the first step to change. Why is it that I come here a couple of times a year, but you are here every hour of every day? Is your life really that sad?

You know, Arthur, at least give Quora a try. But it is incredibly, incredibly, sad, that the only option you have left is to spend your days at the one place on the internet that never censors posts.

See you around December, I have given this place my few minutes one afternoon of the year. But you know you can never leave.

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

I've worked since I was 10. More than you have. Accomplished more, too.

And I did it without the crutch of believing fairy tales are true and without the deplorability of being a conservative.

You don't know what you're talking about, especially with respect to the censorship record at the Volokh Conspiracy, which has repeatedly imposed viewpoint-driven, partisan censorship.

Carry on, clinger. I will continue to contribute to my community, celebrate your replacement with a good beer, and then piss on the grave of your doomed, disgusting, right-wing political preferences.

[Frank Drackman]

Lord love's a workin man!
Now see a doctor and get rid of it!

Frank

[BravoCharlieDelta]

https://twitter.com/amuse/status/1692200762040836579

President Biden used a pseudonym, Robert L. Peters, when emailing his son’s business associates including using it to schedule secret calls with the president of Ukraine. The use of the name prevented discovery of the messages under FOIA.

Now, Gentle Reader, reflect upon this.
The people who believe tweeting to watch a public hearing, or asking an election official for the correct legal remedy, and reserving a room is sufficient evidence to indict someone for trying to overthrow the government

ALSO believe AT THE SAME TIME that
- Children and grand children getting tens of millions of dollars from foreign entities, arranged through a web of 20+ pass thru LLC's
- Years of lying about involvement or knowledge of sons business
- Emails showing involvement with son's foreign business partners
- Bragging on TV about doing what son's foreign business partner asked son to have VP do
- Videos of son compromised with foreign prostitutes and drug users
- And now discovery of a pseudonym which hides his actions as VP from FOIA requests

IS NOT enough to even investigate a politician.

This is why none of these partisans, like Somlin even deserve even the remotest of respect. Frankly, a gnat farting should be more concerning than a legal opinion from such obvious frauds.

-

[BravoCharlieDelta]

Oh shit, now we know where Hunter gets Pedo Peter from. THAT’S why Hunter calls Joe that.

His secret illegal name is Peter AND, like everyone can see, he’s a sick pedophile like Hunter is.

h/t that dude in the replies

[David Nieporent]

The people who believe tweeting to watch a public hearing, or asking an election official for the correct legal remedy, and reserving a room is sufficient evidence to indict someone for trying to overthrow the government

Nobody said that, you lying sack of shit. And I mean that last term in the most professional way possible.

[BravoCharlieDelta]

There wasn't room to list out 100 other fucking tweets you dolt.

[David Nieporent]

Admitting you don't know what "sufficient" means is a start, but it's still a lie no matter how many you list. As you have already been told, the overt acts are not the evidence. Indictments are not lists of evidence.

[BravoCharlieDelta]

evidence
ĕv′ĭ-dəns
noun
A thing or set of things helpful in forming a conclusion or judgment.
Something indicative; an indication or set of indications.

You pedantic dipshit. Those overt acts are a set of things that have helped you form a conclusion or a judgement. They are also a set of things that helped the grand jury form a conclusion that Trump should be indicted.

you stupid moron

[jb]

– Children and grand children getting tens of millions of dollars from foreign entities, arranged through a web of 20+ pass thru LLC’s

AIUI, Hunter has been getting a bunch of money from foreign entities. Are there other children doing the same? Beau is did and I haven't heard anything about Ashley or Nicole so it would be helpful to understand this claim some more.

This probably deserves some scrutiny (not sure Congressional hearings is the right forum). Would you agree we should have been having hearings about the Trump kids as well, though, since this statement certainly applies to them too? The Obama, W and Clinton kids were young enough I don't think this was an issue but we might have to take a look at a lot of other government officials' families as well if this is the standard for investigation.

Years of lying about involvement or knowledge of sons business

Emails showing involvement with son’s foreign business partners

As far as I know, the evidence that holds these claims together is Devon Archer saying that Joe would sometimes say hello to people that Hunter was doing business with. Is that what you think should be investigated?

Bragging on TV about doing what son’s foreign business partner asked son to have VP do

That seems wrong since Devon Archer recently told us that it was actually bad for Burisma to push out Shokin.

Videos of son compromised with foreign prostitutes and drug users

Unclear why Congress would care about that.

And now discovery of a pseudonym which hides his actions as VP from FOIA requests

Interesting and perhaps deserves some scrutiny, but seems like we need a lot more information about what's going on here to have any real opinion one way or the other.

[BravoCharlieDelta]

https://nypost.com/2023/05/10/nine-biden-family-members-who-allegedly-got-foreign-money-identified-by-house-gop/

[jb]

So indeed your own article proves you're lying again. Only one child of Joe Biden is listed there.

[BravoCharlieDelta]

Joe Biden’s son [Hunter], Joe Biden’s brother [James], Joe Biden’s brother’s wife [Sara], Hunter Biden’s girlfriend or Beau Biden’s widow [Hallie], however, you want to write that, Hunter Biden’s ex-wife [Kathleen Buhle], Hunter Biden’s current wife [Melissa Cohen], and three children of the president’s son and the president’s brother,” Comer said.

[jb]

Yep, I can read. That is still precisely one child of Joe Biden despite your initial claim that his "children" were getting foreign transfers.

Now if your argument is that that's a lot of people associated with Hunter Biden or maybe even James Biden, I'd agree with you but I know it doesn't help with your lies.

[BravoCharlieDelta]

Wait so you see that list which includes his dead sons wife amd grandchildren and you use that tiny pedantic parse as a cognitive out so you don't have to contemplate the deep corruption of your tribal elite?

You parse out the difference between "daughter" and "daughter in law" to latch on to "child" vs "children" to ignore all of the evidence.

lol wow that's stunning.

[jb]

The author of the list makes it pretty clear that she's on the list through her association with Hunter not with Beau.

Regardless, when you say "children" to most people they don't assume you mean in-laws. If someone asked you how many kids you have, no one counts the people their children got married to.

If you want people to take your overall point seriously, maybe stop lying all the time and then we can focus on the substance that you are trying to convey instead of the lies.

[BravoCharlieDelta]

Look at how hard you work to avoid the substance.

You didn't even know this was out there.

And tomorrow you will have forgotten all about it.

[M L]

Have to admit that is all pretty concerning and potentially really unjust and unfair and one sided if true.

[BravoCharlieDelta]

Ok, fellow 1776 Americans, the FBI has now struck a third time murdering another American.

https://twitter.com/pepesgrandma/status/1692227775787303053

Look out if they come to your house, they are coming for your life.

3 Obama/Biden FBI Raids. 3 Dead 1776 Patriots.

Next month, 30? 300? 3,000?

[jb]

Kind of an old article, but as of 2013 it looks like the FBI was killing about 10 people per year (70 from 1993 to early 2011):

https://www.nytimes.com/2013/06/19/us/in-150-shootings-the-fbi-deemed-agents-faultless.html

And yes, unsurprisingly, they usually think that the shooting was justified.

I'm sure you were absolutely outraged about this at the time.

[BravoCharlieDelta]

I’m outraged every time the Democrats in the Administrative State get away with their crimes. We see day after day how evil and vile these people are. I loathe them.

Where have you been?

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

3 Dead 1776 Patriots

Three more episodes of Play Stupid Games, Win Stupid Prizes.

I doubt any of them will be missed.

[Frank Drackman]

I don't know, people seemed to get upset about Floyd George for some reason. I think maybe because he looked like King Kong swatting away the Bi-planes, people just feel sorry for a big monkey getting hassled by "The Man"

[M L]

Pretty good interview with . . . Argentina libertarian running for Pres?

https://twitter.com/WallStreetSilv/status/1692178275731485002

[Alpheus W Drinkwater]

We've reached the final 4 of the fantastic FIDE World Chess Cup 2023, the long, grueling chess knockout tournament. Magnus Carlsen, who has never been able to win this event, takes on hometown favorite Nijat Abasov. He is Azerbaijani, and the tournament is in Baku. In the other semi, American Fabiano Caruana takes on the 18 year old Indian phenom Rameshbabu Praggnanandhaa. The chess has been absolutely amazing. Some very surprising upsets along the way.

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

What happened to vibrating cheater guy?

Here's a better one.

Some of the REMers are touring as The Baseball Project. Small clubs, mostly. Worth catching if they visit your neighborhood. DC tonight, New York tomorrow, then Boston, etc.

The repertoire includes include Harvey Haddix, Ted Fucking Williams, Satchel Paige Said, The Death of Big Ed Delahanty, The Day Dock Went Hunting Heads, Grand Salami Time, New Oh In Town, 42, Buckner's Bolero, To The Veterans Committee, The Yankee Flipper, and Extra Inning of Love.

[Alpheus W Drinkwater]

Vibrating cheater guy (Hans Niemann) has been playing a LOT of chess, and doing pretty well, on the whole. He did not get an invite to play in this tournament, perhaps because Carlsen is also there.

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

Did he attract a following of misfits and clowns consequent to his admitted cheating?

[Alpheus W Drinkwater]

It's a bit of a mixed bag. He got sympathy in some quarters from people who think Carlsen and chess.com overreacted. But there is a significant number of people who simply consider him a cheater and beyond redemption. He's a talented player, but he'll never shake that tag. He was just a teenager when the admitted cheating incidents happened, seems a shame to condemn him for bad decisions he made as a teenager. A little like Justice Kavanaugh, I suppose.

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

Have you concluded the recent allegations of cheating were unfair? (I haven't followed it enough to reach a conclusion.)

[Alpheus W Drinkwater]

I think unproven would be more accurate, although Magnus seemed pretty sure of himself. I wouldn't want to argue with Magnus about chess, but he has been known to be a bit petulant about losses.

[grb]

Alpheus W Drinkwater : “The chess has been absolutely amazing”

Alas, not mine. The only people I’ve played recently have been the two great nephews, and there I take elaborate measures to engineer their victories. With the older boy, I regularly give tactical advice, hint at the best possible move, throw in an occasional bonehead play and force him to see them, then guide him thru the final checkmate attack. And after all that? He shamelessly gloats over every win.

That just leaves me with the computer and we view each other with equal distain as opponents. In my show of contempt, I breeze thru play barely considering the board. In return, the computer will win a dozen games mercilessly strangling my position with relentless force. Point made, it then switches to Dolt Mode and lets me win a few. But if I get get an even endgame, victory is pretty much assured. For some reason, the computer is programed to panic like gallied whales really late in a game.

[Alpheus W Drinkwater]

Ha! Which program do you use? The older programs were notoriously bad at endgames, but the newer engines aren't bad at anything, far better than the best human. Unfortunately.

Only one of my kids really took to chess, by the time he was in high school we were pretty evenly matched. I haven't played anything but correspondence chess for a long time, but I still enjoy following the big tournaments.

[BravoCharlieDelta]

What should happen to that Democrat officia in Maui that wouldn't release that water?

He's on record as saying access to water as an equity issue. It's not unreasonable to believe that he might have been trying to make things more equity by denying people water access since that's how equity always gets implemented.

[myself]

Wow....

Trump is attacking the African American DA by referencing the N-word.

Before any of these trials even start I think Trump may get in serious trouble for threats towards the judges and prosecutors.

[grb]

Take a look, people. That’s what passes for cleverness in today’s Right…

[BravoCharlieDelta]

Election Riggers.

You guys beclown yourselves. You're living memes.

https://i.kym-cdn.com/photos/images/original/000/349/990/304.gif

[Mr. Bumble]

Thank God he didn't call her niggardly.

[Nige]

yet

[Frank Drackman]

Nige-bot thinks "Niggardly" refers to Niggers.

[M L]

This again but with the word "rigger"?

Definitely history repeating itself as parody.

https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1999-jan-29-mn-2884-story.html

[myself]

Yeah sure, Trump capitalized 'RIGGER' when criticizing a black person with zero intent of referencing the n-word.

And he's done absolutely nothing to stop many of his followers from using 'RIGGER' in a clearly racist way because?

It's textbook Trump. Make your intent clear with an absolutely minimal level of deniability and then stand back as people act on that intent (and let them know they're on the right track by the lack of objection).

It's the same M.O. that Cohen described:
Cohen said Trump did not directly tell him to lie, but "he would look me in the eye and tell me there's no business in Russia and then go out and lie to the American people by saying the same thing."

"In his way, he was telling me to lie," Cohen said.
[...]
"[Trump] doesn't give you questions, he doesn't give you orders, he speaks in code, and I understand the code because I've been around him for a decade."

It's the same thing Trump did on Jan 6th, he may not have known what the crowd would do, but they knew he wanted them to do everything they could to disrupt the count and his silence let them knew he didn't object.

And it's the same thing with this, Trump meant a play on the N-word, if he did then he would have corrected his followers when they took that cue. And everyone, including you I suspect, understands that.

[Frank Drackman]

Didn't a certain VPOTUS "Contest" a Presidential Erection a few years back? Even tried to "Find" extra votes in DemoKKKrat Counties?? Tried to block "Mail In" Absentee ballots that were a day or two late??? Whatever happened to that guy (I mean besides gaining 150lbs, diddling his maid, divorcing his wife, and singlehandedly adding more CO2 to the Troposphere with his G6 than any other VPOTUS in history)

Frank

[Mr. Bumble]

…but he did serve as a “reporter” in the war. All of 5 months, one month longer than John F(ucking) Kerry.

[Martinned]

Really? Thought you'd do a little swiftboating for old times' sake?

[Mr. Bumble]

John Kerry is and was a POS.
What an amazing service record. In four months he managed three Purple Hearts among other medals which he claimed he threw over the White House fence going on to bad mouth those still serving.
Then he shows up a King Charles' coronation looking like a Soviet WWII pensioner wearing those medal.

[Martinned]

At least he didn't have bone spurs.

[Mr. Bumble]

"When his education deferments expired in 1968, Biden requested a deferment based on the fact he had asthma as a teenager. He did this in spite of the fact that, according to his own book, he was a star athlete in high school and in college played intramural sports and was a lifeguard in the summer."

https://www.armytimes.com/opinion/commentary/2021/01/21/dodging-and-deferring-trump-wasnt-the-only-potus-to-avoid-the-draft/

[Martinned]

So now we have two draft dodgers and a war hero. Why do you throw obscenities at the war hero?

[Mr. Bumble]

A hero in the war he called immoral? Quite a joker you are.

[Martinned]

That makes him twice a hero.

[Mr. Bumble]

Just hope you never share a fox hole (or swift boat) with him.
When he's finally buried in Arlington it will be the final insult from a man who has never done or said an honest word in his life.
The only thing he ever did well was to marry rich women.

[Martinned]

Why do you have so little respect for America's veterans? Do you really hate America that much?

[Mr. Bumble]

You asshole, I am a veteran of that war which is why I have NO respect for John F(fucking) Kerry!

[Martinned]

If you are loyal to your fellow veterans but only if they agree with you politically, maybe you didn't quite understand what you were fighting for.

[Nige]

Also seems to think it's patriotic and heroic to cover up war crimes.

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

You asshole, I am a veteran of that war

Well, that explains getting our asses kicked by a bunch of ragtag irregulars, settling for a vague draw despite enormous taxpayer-provided resource advantages.

[Mr. Bumble]

Responding to Martinned:
"f you are loyal to your fellow veterans but only if they agree with you politically, maybe you didn’t quite understand what you were fighting for."
I am loyal to veterans who did not dishonor the service and sacrifice of those who served (and were still serving) by bradly painting them as war criminals.

[Martinned]

The honourable thing to do is to call out (war) crimes wherever you see them. Covering up (war) crimes is a disgrace to the uniform when the army does it and when, say, the police does it.

[Magister]

Military service seems to be a disadvantage for modern presidential candidates; the last major party candidate with military service was McCain in 2008, and candidates with no or less military service prevailed in each election starting in 1992 - George H. W. Bush, Bob Dole, Al Gore, John Kerry and John McCain were all candidates with significant military service defeated by candidates with either no military service or who avoided Vietnam in the National Guard.

[Mr. Bumble]

Neither Gore no Kerry had "significant" military service.
To his credit Gore responded to the draft and served two years in the Army. However; some how his tour in Vietnam was only 5 months long (a regular tour was one year).
Although Kerry served for four years, his Vietnam service was only four months rather than a year. Something to do with "winning" three Purple Hearts. A regular Audie Murphy.
While I'd agree that GW's service was sketchy he did serve for six years and was honorably discharged.

[grb]

"During the night of December 2 and early morning of December 3, 1968, Kerry was in charge of a small boat operating near a peninsula north of Cam Ranh Bay together with a Swift boat (PCF-60). According to Kerry and the two crewmen who accompanied him that night, Patrick Runyon and William Zaladonis, they surprised a group of Vietnamese men unloading sampans at a river crossing, who began running and failed to obey an order to stop. As the men fled, Kerry and his crew opened fire on the sampans and destroyed them, then rapidly left. During this encounter, Kerry received a shrapnel wound in the left arm above the elbow. It was for this injury that Kerry received his first Purple Heart Medal.

Kerry received his second Purple Heart for a wound received in action on the Bo De River on February 20, 1969. The plan had been for the Swift boats to be accompanied by support helicopters. On the way up the Bo De, however, the helicopters were attacked. As the Swift boats reached the Cua Lon River, Kerry's boat was hit by a B-40 rocket (rocket propelled grenade round), and a piece of shrapnel hit Kerry's left leg, wounding him. Thereafter, enemy fire ceased and his boat reached the Gulf of Thailand safely. Kerry continues to have shrapnel embedded in his left thigh because the doctors that first treated him decided to remove the damaged tissue and close the wound with sutures rather than make a wide opening to remove the shrapnel.[Although wounded like several others earlier that day, Kerry did not lose any time off from duty."

"Eight days later, on February 28, 1969, came the events for which Kerry was awarded his Silver Star Medal. On this occasion, Kerry was in tactical command of his Swift boat and two other Swift boats during a combat operation. Their mission on the Duong Keo River included bringing an underwater demolition team and dozens of South Vietnamese Marines to destroy enemy sampans, structures and bunkers as described in the story The Death Of PCF 43. Running into heavy small arms fire from the river banks, Kerry "directed the units to turn to the beach and charge the Viet Cong positions" and he "expertly directed" his boat's fire causing the enemy to flee while at the same time coordinating the insertion of the ninety South Vietnamese troops (according to the original medal citation signed by Admiral Elmo Zumwalt). Moving a short distance upstream, Kerry's boat was the target of a B-40 rocket round; Kerry charged the enemy positions and as his boat hove to and beached, a Viet Cong ("VC") insurgent armed with a rocket launcher emerged from a spider hole and ran. While the boat's gunner opened fire, wounding the VC in the leg, and while the other boats approached and offered cover fire, Kerry jumped from the boat to pursue the VC insurgent, subsequently killing him and capturing his loaded rocket launcher.

Kerry's commanding officer, Lieutenant Commander George Elliott, stated to Douglas Brinkley in 2003 that he did not know whether to court-martial Kerry for beaching the boat without orders or give him a medal for saving the crew. Elliott recommended Kerry for the Silver Star, and Zumwalt flew into An Thoi to personally award medals to Kerry and the rest of the sailors involved in the mission. The Navy's account of Kerry's actions is presented in the original medal citation signed by Zumwalt. The engagement was documented in an after-action report, a press release written on March 1, 1969, and a historical summary dated March 17, 1969."

On March 13, 1969, on the Bái Háp River, Kerry was in charge of one of five Swift boats that were returning to their base after performing an Operation Sealords mission to transport South Vietnamese troops from the garrison at Cái Nước and MIKE Force advisors for a raid on a Vietcong camp located on the Rach Dong Cung canal. Earlier in the day, Kerry received a slight shrapnel wound in the buttocks from blowing up a rice bunker. Debarking some but not all of the passengers at a small village, the boats approached a fishing weir; one group of boats went around to the left of the weir, hugging the shore, and a group with Kerry's PCF-94 boat went around to the right, along the shoreline. A mine was detonated directly beneath the lead boat, PCF-3, as it crossed the weir to the left, lifting PCF-3 "about 2–3 ft out of water".

"James Rassmann, a Green Beret advisor who was aboard Kerry's PCF-94, was knocked overboard when, according to witnesses and the documentation of the event, a mine or rocket exploded close to the boat. According to the documentation for the event, Kerry's arm was injured when he was thrown against a bulkhead during the explosion. PCF 94 returned to the scene and Kerry rescued Rassmann who was receiving sniper fire from the water. Kerry received the Bronze Star Medal with Combat "V" for "heroic achievement", for his actions during this incident; he also received his third Purple Heart."

Sounds like a pretty good record to me, Bumble....

[Magister]

Gore and Kerry both went to Vietnam, which was significant enough at the time that some people with the right connections chose more years in the National Guard to avoid service in Vietnam, even ignoring any other sketchiness in that National Guard service.

Kerry served for four years, and the policy of leaving Vietnam if wounded three times was standard at the time, regardless of the severity (and the Navy inspector general concluded his awards were properly approved). And you fail to mention a Silver Star and Bronze Star; his service was well thought of by his contemporaries, until partisan politics led to Swift boating. The acceptability of such attacks in that campaign by itself makes my point. From Wikipedia:

Defenders of John Kerry's war record, who include nine of the ten living crewmen who served under him, have charged that organizers of [Swift Boat Veterans for Truth] had close ties to the Bush presidential campaign and that the accusations were false and politically motivated.

Gore only served two years, but the brevity of his Vietnam deployment was not his doing, or from influence exerted on his behalf.
https://archive.nytimes.com/www.nytimes.com/library/politics/camp/071100wh-gore.html
(via Wikipedia)

Mr. Gore was waiting to go to Vietnam, too. All his friends remember that he wanted to go, and the usual course of a two-year hitch in the Army included a year there.

The Gore family could never prove their suspicions, denied by various Nixon administration officials, that Mr. Gore's orders were deliberately held up. At the time, his Army buddies said, they were convinced President Nixon would not allow him to go to Vietnam -- not while there was even a slight chance it might do Senator Gore some political good should something bad happen to his son.

But the fact that Mr. Gore was eventually sent to Vietnam with only seven months left to serve in his hitch was highly unusual. In the end, Mr. Gore shipped out the month after the election./blockquote>

[Mr. Bumble]

Hunter Biden case dismissed in Delafuckinnoware because DOJ says they intend to file in another district (in about 5 years).

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

Former Pres. Trump:

Rather than releasing the Report on the Rigged & Stolen Georgia 2020 Presidential Election on Monday, my lawyers would prefer putting this, I believe, Irrefutable & Overwhelming evidence of Election Fraud & Irregularities in formal Legal Filings as we fight to dismiss this disgraceful Indictment

He's roughly as literate as the average Trump-Volokh Conspiracy fan.

Why do Republicans flaunt random capitalization and flout standard English?

[NOVA Lawyer]

Good grammar and clear writing are elitist. They’re anti-elite. Or stupid. Given that the leader of their anti-elite crusade inherited a fortune and disdains them as gullible losers, it's hard to say which is the predominant cause.

[BravoCharlieDelta]

Meanwhile, 2+2=4 is a racist construct to you people.

It’s your side that says good grammar, proper speech, cursive handwriting, and general White competence is racist and is rabidly erasing the standards from public schooling in the name of serving Justice and Equity.

You people have zero self awareness.

[NOVA Lawyer]

"You people have zero self awareness."

Pot, meet kettle.

The above comments were in response to the former President and a commenter here using weird, non-standard capitalization and English grammar. They were responses to specific people, including the leader of the GOP.

You respond with the assertion that someone, somewhere on the Left holds views which you imagine they hold and so we're the hypocrites for pointing out the prevalence of bad grammar and weird capitalization by Trump and commenters here.

You're a joke, BCD. A fucking joke.

[BravoCharlieDelta]

Here you go, you amazingly ignorant moron.

https://www.wsj.com/articles/in-california-2-2-4-may-be-thought-racist-11621876555

[NOVA Lawyer]

Who's the moron, BCD?

You'll find nowhere in that link to an opinion piece (well, the link in the link, as the link you provide is to letters to the editor about the opinion piece) any quote or even attribution to someone the belief that 2 + 2 = 4 is racist. Sure, either the author or the editors chose a proactively, hyperbolic headline, but you're a drooling idiot if you read the article and don't understand that it was hyperbole, not reporting anyone's actual views.

So you're one of those people who reads a headline in conservative opinion pages and thinks they have an accurate take on left wing thought? That's the idiocy of morons, BCD. QED.

To be fair, someone, somewhere, has rather extreme views about how to teach children math, but your characterization of the substance of the article is false.

(By the way, even if it were true that you could show someone, somewhere held that idea and they were "on the left", you can't show that they are prominent in the party or that they comment here. Whackjob picking is just a way to lean into your confirmation bias. Which, when you intentionally do it, is another form of idiocy.)

[BravoCharlieDelta]

A math education professor in New York City claimed that the equation 2+2=4 “reeks of white supremacist patriarchy.”A math education professor in New York City claimed that the equation 2+2=4 “reeks of white supremacist patriarchy.”

https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/news/math-professor-claims-equation-2-2-4-reeks-of-white-supremacist-patriarchy

"Saying 2+2=4 is an example of covert white supremacy, according to a group of influential math teachers in Ontario. "

https://torontosun.com/opinion/columnists/lilley-radical-teachers-claim-that-saying-224-is-white-supremacy

Spin these doofus. You're so low information you weren't aware of all the ruckus and how widespread that specific claim even was.

[BravoCharlieDelta]

Don't bother spinning those.

https://www.reddit.com/r/mathmemes/comments/129k8kq/math_is_racist/

There is a video that you can't spin. So just marinate in your limited knowledge of what's going on in the world.

[NOVA Lawyer]

"There is a video that you can’t spin"

Are you really that slow? You linked to a FoxNews video of two conservatives circle jerking about what they imagine other people think or are arguing. The one of the viewers' left is, obviously, a Fox News host. The woman on the viewers' right is Karlyn Boresenko "a conservative influencer." A video of you and Sean Hannity discussing what you think "the left" thinks doesn't prove, at all, what "the left" thinks. You understand that, right?

You've got to be fucking smarter than this.

[David Nieporent]

You’ve got to be fucking smarter than this.

Does he, though?

[NOVA Lawyer]

Touche.

[NOVA Lawyer]

As I pointed out, you are nutpicking, not demonstrating that the “Left” is like this generally. You’ve got one teacher who is questioning whether math is culturally neutral (not disputing 2 + 2 = 4). On the other side, is the former President of the United States and current de facto leader of the GOP bizarrely capitalizing random words, misspelling something in almost every tweet, and otherwise mangling grammar. Ditto for his suckers in these comment threads.

We were discussing what is a very common, but weird, use of English by people in the right wing. You are finding a single person who doesn’t even say what you originally said they said, that the equation “2 + 2 = 4 is racist.” And if you don’t understand that’s not what she said, you need to reread the article. And if you don’t understand the difference between the former President of the United States engaging in loopy behavior and some random teacher engaging in loopy behavior, that may well explain your vote and political views.

The other article deals with people in Canada, so they aren’t part of the American left. And, again, nutpicking. Nobody in these comment threads agrees with them. Whereas, there are plenty of examples in these comment threads of the non-standard and bizarre uses of English and capitalization. Which was the original point you whatabouted.

[BravoCharlieDelta]

More for you, you typical low-information Democrat.

Ethical and anti-racist grading of grammar: reassessing rubric values

https://cardinalscholar.bsu.edu/items/7de133c7-5173-4c78-beea-0c5db46a6016

[NOVA Lawyer]

BCD's claim:

"It’s your side that says good grammar, proper speech, cursive handwriting, and general White competence is racist."

The view expressed in the article he links:

"There is nothing inherently wrong with the dominant white, middle class English… but using it to judge others, to punish or withhold opportunities and privileges, is racist...”

Apparently, you are really bad at differentiating whether a thing, say grammar or a police baton, is racist or whether the use of that thing may be racist.

But I know you love nothing more than caricature to lean into your pre-existing biases. If you didn't rely on caricatures, you may actually have to engage in good faith. I'm assuming you understand you aren't equipped for any success with that.

[BravoCharlieDelta]

Why do I always get surprised when some Democrat Know Nothing knows nothing.

https://aninjusticemag.com/judging-someones-grammar-makes-you-look-bad-not-them-e0f37d8c36aa

https://tsl.news/opinion-grammar-upholds-an-oppressive-system/

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

BravoCharlieDelta: Would you please identify the people at the Veterans Administration whose conduct unhinged you?

I want to send them some beer.

[Frank Drackman]

Coach Sandusky, using beer to entice underage boys, some things never change.

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

I think it's great that Frank Drackman is this white, male, conservative, shit-rate blog's greatest defender.

[Davedave]

If the VA had any interaction with BCD, it was to tell him to fuck off with his attempts to claim veterans' benefits without ever having served. People who spend their lives in mental institutions are ineligible to serve.

[Frank Drackman]

So which institution did you serve in, fruit cake?

[jdoeford]

I have him muted. He's a troll. Why bother?

[BravoCharlieDelta]

No one cares what some internet nobody says about the Champ.

[not guilty]

Counsel for Donald Trump have submitted a proposed scheduling order in the District of Columbia for the jury trial to begin in April 2026. https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.dcd.258149/gov.uscourts.dcd.258149.30.0_2.pdf

[Jason Cavanaugh]

April 2026? LOL.

He sure thinks he's special.

[Frank Drackman]

"LOL" all you want, your typical Felony case in Spook-ville takes 5-6 years to get to court, heck, it took almost 3 years to charge him.

[not guilty]

I wonder how Trump will be able to adhere to his conditions of pretrial release pending trial. If not, requesting a far off trial date could come back and bite him in the backside.

[Moderation4ever]

When I first read this I wondered if he was trying to push it back past the 2024 election or push it out to when he might be dead from natural causes. He is 77 now and would be 80 by the time of trial.

[SRG2]

This more reasonable schedule—equal to the government’s time spent investigating

A novel idea - the time given to a defendant to prepare for a trial should equal the time it took for the investigation. Riiiiight

[mydisplayname]

It is a rare day when one must say "Thanks for citing Justice Taney in support of your position. Do you have any citations from Beelzebub to add?" But those are the fun days. 🙂

[Martinned]

Interesting brief summary of the law on jury intimidation (and jury nullification) in the US and the UK in this Substack post: https://rozenberg.substack.com/p/intimidating-a-jury

[SRG2]

FWIW nullification is not as big a deal in the UK - possibly because we never had decades of 30-minute acquittals of white murderers, and possibly because it's seen as a traditional and legitimate jury action. See the Clive Ponting trial for an obvious instance.

When I emailed someone on a forum a few years back about the differences in attitude of UK and US to nullification, they responded cc'ing Stewart Rhodes of Oath Keeper fame.

[Martinned]

I reckon it's also caused by the fact that English judges have a long history of bullying and overruling the jury. Nowadays that's all carefully regulated by statute and supervised by the appellate courts, but in the olden days the quarter sessions were pretty gun-ho about how they understood the common law that governed the relationship between the judge and the jury.

Rozenberg himself cited R. v. Schot & Barclay (1997), where two jurors refused to return a verdict and were held in contempt and sentenced to imprisonment. This finding was quashed on appeal, but the Court of Appeal didn't necessarily take a subsequent contempt prosecution off the table (or a substantial fine following such a trial).

https://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWCA/Crim/1997/3424.html

[Davedave]

Did Rozenberg mention R v Owen, where a man seeking revenge took a shotgun and attempted to murder someone, but was acquitted by a jury of fellow thugs? Or is he, like you’d expect on substack, presenting a deliberately one-eyed ‘view’ which pretends to be journalism but is in fact hard/far-right propaganda?

[Edit: it was Owen, not Owens as I originally mis-typed.]

[SRG2]

But check out this famous 17thC instance :

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bushel%27s_Case

[Davedave]

If it's on substack, then it's insane far right nonsense and you just haven't realised it because you don't know enough about the subject and the author is doing a good job hiding the nutjobbery.

[Martinned]

Joshua Rozenberg is a British legal journalist of almost 50 years standing. He started his career working for the BBC, and has since published in just about every respectable newspaper in the UK. I see no reason to blame him for asking people to pay for some of his content.

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

[Davedave]

Evidently he’s no longer pursuing a serious career, if he’s taken the substack money. But let’s be honest, he stopped that in favour of hard-right partisan hackery decades ago.

The man is married to Melanie Phillips, for fuck’s sake. Melanie ‘taking the knee is a racist statement’ Phillips. Melanie ‘Londonistan’ Phillips. Melanie ‘destroy the Muslim world’ Phillips.

You don’t stay married to an overtly racist cow like that unless you agree with her.

You are hardly disproving the point about substack being solely a home for right-wing nutjobs, here. It's like Telegram, but for pseudo-journalists.

[David Nieporent]

Wow. The first post from you on this, I thought was sarcasm. But you're doubling down. You really are insane.

[Davedave]

It's weird the way you and Martin think you're doing so much better than BCD, but actually just have a more subtle version of the same believe-what-you-want-to-believe confirmation bias going on. If it matches your preconceptions, that's enough - no need to challenge yourselves, no need to examine the sources properly.

I'm really not sure what you're arguing with here. Do you actually think Substack isn't solely for the nut-wing? It's a site for people who can't get what they want to write published by any outlet with an editor.

Or are you seriously arguing that Mr Melanie Phillips, who left the fucking Telegraph - the Telegraph! - because he was too right wing for it, isn't a hard-right hack?

[David Nieporent]

Yes, I actually think Substack isn't solely for the nut-wing. In fact, I know it for a fact, because I follow plenty of non "nut-wing" publishers there: some libertarian, some liberal (Yglesias, Legum), some moderate conservative (e.g., the NeverTrump folks at the Bulwark), some whose politics are hard to characterize (e.g., Popehat), and many apolitical people publishing on random topics from sports to technology to productivity.

I am not familiar with Rozenberg, so I cannot opine on him (though Wikipedia suggests you're mistaken about why he left the Telegraph), but your misogynistic attacks on his wife are part of your usual pattern of being a jackass. And, more importantly, I know that you are a loon, because you routinely say the most insane things here.

[JoePalange]

It kind of always felt to me like Hayak was kind of supporting the idea of living constitutionalism in Law, Legislation and Liberty in Vol. I. Am I the only one who interpreted it this way, and how would you guys juxtapose that argument to the one contained within our current debates about jurisprudence?

[Martinned]

I’ve been playing with ChatGPT, and since we’re already 600+ comments in, it seems OK to copy/paste its response to your query in some detail:

Friedrich Hayek’s views on constitutionalism, as presented in “Law, Legislation and Liberty,” can be complex and open to interpretation. While some aspects of his work might resonate with living constitutionalism to a certain extent, it’s important to recognize that Hayek’s ideas are often situated within the broader context of his political and economic philosophy. Let’s explore his perspective and how it relates to current debates in jurisprudence.

In “Law, Legislation and Liberty,” particularly in Volume I (“Rules and Order”), Hayek emphasizes the importance of the rule of law, predictability, and limited government intervention in maintaining a free and just society. He argues for the idea that law should be general, abstract, and impartially applied, allowing individuals to plan their lives and activities with confidence in the stability of the legal framework.

It’s possible to see a connection between some aspects of Hayek’s thought and certain elements of living constitutionalism, especially if one focuses on the idea of adaptability to changing circumstances. Living constitutionalism often emphasizes that the interpretation of the constitution should evolve over time to address new social, cultural, and technological developments while upholding the core principles of justice and individual rights.

However, Hayek’s emphasis on the rule of law and limited government intervention should not necessarily be interpreted as an endorsement of a fluid or expansive interpretation of constitutional provisions. Hayek’s broader philosophy is more aligned with a cautious approach to change, wherein the fundamental principles and rules should be stable and predictable to provide a framework for individual liberty.

In current debates about jurisprudence, the tension between originalism (interpreting the constitution according to its original meaning) and living constitutionalism (interpreting the constitution in light of contemporary values and societal changes) is an ongoing discussion. While aspects of Hayek’s ideas might find resonance in the adaptability and flexibility of living constitutionalism, his broader focus on the importance of stable rules and the rule of law aligns more closely with originalist arguments that prioritize maintaining the integrity of the constitution’s original intent.

Ultimately, Hayek’s perspective on constitutionalism may be subject to varying interpretations, and his ideas could be integrated into both sides of the jurisprudential debate depending on how they are applied and understood in the context of modern legal theories. It’s important to engage with his work in detail and consider how it intersects with broader philosophical and legal discussions.

[OKSteele]

This was interesting and I appreciate you posting it. I'll just say that I think his perspective seems to value Judge made law, over Legislation in the fact that it is responsive to society through a kind of free market that brings issues up from the bottom, as opposed to enforcing legislation from the top. His focus on stable rules and the rule of law fit within this broader context. He argues that this form of judge made law is more prescriptive and less sweeping in the Burkean sense than it's legislative counterpart. It seems at odds with textualism and originalism to me.

[Sarcastr0]

Hayek was a great economist. Dunno why we should take his economic advice.

Though also judge made, or common law, was a big part of our justice system at the Founding, so it is originalist to have judge made law in areas like torts or contracts.

The issue comes in when you look at constitutional law.

[Martinned]

I'm not sure why constitutional law is conceptually different. Even at the time of the founding areas like torts and contracts were at least partly governed by statute law, so the notion of courts developing the law in parallel with Parliament/whoever-gets-to-adopt-written-law was perfectly familiar to the founders. In all those areas you apply the usual canons of interpretation to the written law, with the courts using stare decisis to promote consistency, and you apply a straightforward common law method to issues not governed by written law. The Supreme Court's holding that there is no such thing as Federal Common Law always struck me as turning on a very narrow definition of common law, because arguably in so holding they were developing the Federal Common Law.

[Sarcastr0]

I concur with you both as to the constitution and federal common law actually still being a thing, as does Will Baude, but wanted not to open a can of worms above.

[BravoCharlieDelta]

“This case begins and ends with standing,” Quattlebaum wrote. “The parents have not alleged that their children have gender support plans, are transgender or are even struggling with issues of gender identity.

“As a result, they have not alleged facts that the Montgomery County public schools have any information about their children that is currently being withheld or that there is a substantial risk information will be withheld in the future. Thus, under the Constitution, they have not alleged the type of injury required to show standing.”

https://www.metroweekly.com/2023/08/court-rules-parents-cant-challenge-gender-support-plans/

On the surface, that seems to make sense. But thinking about it for one freaking second will tell you how twisted and sick it really is.

If these kids have a secret gender transition plan assigned to them, then
a.) the parents will never know until it's way too late to save the child because it can be kept secret
b.) that child has already been groomed by the fucking freak sickos.

Since it's Montgomery County, MD, most likely it will be a bunch of Democrat children groomed, so at least we got that going for us. Fuck those people and their kids.

[SRG2]

Grooming: (i) Democrats talking to children about sex and about gender identification (ii) taking children to drag shows
Not grooming: Republicans getting close to children at school, sports, or church and then molesting them for years.

[BravoCharlieDelta]

Meanwhile 1 in 6 boys are victims of sexual assault.

Do you know how doesn't sexually assault young boys? Heterosexual men.

[SRG2]

Do you know how doesn’t sexually assault young boys? Heterosexual men.

Dennis Hastert is married.

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

Fuck those people and their kids.

These bigoted, antisocial assholes are your target audience and biggest fans, Volokh Conspirators . . . and the reason tenure is the only thing between you and a pink slip.

[Davedave]

How the fuck could you fail to notice your child was transitioning? Even for you, BCD, that's beyond loony.

Hint: dressing as the other gender is quite noticeable.

[Frank Drackman]

The Patient Information pamphlets
"So you want to have your Penis/Clitoris/Breasts/Testicles/Ovaries Cut off/out" might be a clue.

Frank

[BravoCharlieDelta]

The Democrats at the schools groom them to only do it at school and not at home.

Where the hell have you been?

[Davedave]

You're madder than a box of frogs, and stupider than the box.

[BravoCharlieDelta]

https://www.nytimes.com/2023/01/22/us/gender-identity-students-parents.html

Now what, idiot?

[Davedave]

Now you're proving my point, that someone would have to be an absolutely terrible parent to fail to notice such things. Which is what that article is about.

You really are as dim as you seem, aren't you? It's lucky your home provides the inmates with computers and inmate access or you'd be writing these messages in your own shit on the walls of the room you're locked inside.

[BravoCharlieDelta]

Does the article support my point about them being transed at school, but then acting normal at home?

Yes.

Moron.

[Nige]

Demolishing a Barbie Dream House with a bible taped to a baseball bat.

https://twitter.com/TheTNHoller/status/1692282105227555324

[Nige]

Apropos of someone posting a study about plastic pollution in a previous thread.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/brucelee/2023/08/14/microplastics-found-in-human-hearts-for-first-time-showing-impact-of-pollution/

[Martinned]

This might amuse some of you. (I think the issue has come up in VC comments sections before.)

Beef over ‘veggie burger’ name to be settled by EU court ruling

A forthcoming ruling by the EU top court should clarify the use of names linked with foodstuffs of animal origin for plant-based food products, according to meat alternatives campaigners.
(...)
“This case will determine once and for all whether the EU will take a harmonised approach to plant-based food labels or force companies and consumers to contend with up to 27 different rules,” commented Elena Walden, senior policy manager at the Good Food Institute Europe.

According to Walden, the EU judges’ interpretation will have far-reaching implications for the sector since other EU countries, such as Italy and Belgium, are considering putting forward national laws to ban the use of meat-related terms for plant-based products.

https://www.euractiv.com/section/agriculture-food/news/beef-over-veggie-burger-name-to-be-settled-by-eu-court-ruling/