Thursday Open Thread

What's on your mind?

Comments

[darkknight9]

I have a bet with some neighbors. The stakes are cashews for the winner. Before the election: One thinks Trump dies or is in prison. The other thinks Biden falls into a grave. So I told them my side of this bet is that I think they both die.

You should never wish for a persons death but... its cashews!!!! 🙂

[Brett Bellmore]

Hardly anybody ever falls into a grave, except cemetery employees. That was a fool's bet.

[darkknight9]

"falls into a grave" being an attempt to say the person is taking a dirt nap. Dying. Etc. 🙂

It might be a longshot but its all for a donated can of cash(ews). I'm not out anything.

[Brett Bellmore]

Yeah, based on actuary tables, it is a long shot. Trump's 78, and Biden's 82.

At the age of 78, you've got about a 5.4% chance of dying in a given year, at 82, about 8%. Combined probability of them BOTH dying this year? 0.4%, about one in 231.

And most of that mortality, realistically, comes from members of the cohort who are a lot more sickly than either of them.

It's not impossible, obviously, and the average person doesn't have to worry about political assassination, but not great odds.

[Mr. Bumble]

You forgot to factor in "or is in prison".

[Brett Bellmore]

I factored in your saying you bet on them both dying.

[bernard11]

And most of that mortality, realistically, comes from members of the cohort who are a lot more sickly than either of them.

And don't forget they are both going to get much better medical care than average.

[David Nieporent]

Combined probability of them BOTH dying this year? 0.4%, about one in 231.

You're assuming the probabilities are independent. But what if they both die in a duel against each other?

[Krychek_2]

Or if the Secret Service decides it would be in the best interests of the country to shoot both of them?

[Stella Link the dog]

"You’re assuming the probabilities are independent."

I thought about that also, but can't think of any good reason to think that the probabilities cannot be considerd independent. Sure, they might both die in a duel or perhaps they will be together debating in Cairo, Illinois when the next big New Madrid earthquakes arrive. Pretty unlikely though. But it is fun to imagine.

[Mr. Bumble]

Strange idea of "fun" especially with Kamala on deck.

[Stella Link the dog]

"Strange idea of “fun” "

Not so strange. Roller coasters are fun, horror movies are fun, disaster movies are fun, war movies are fun. Mass murders, wars, airplane crashes,monumental earthquakes, presidential assassinations, attempted insurrections, not so much.

As for Kamala, much less a scary idea than Trump.

[Davy C]

Historically, 8 Presidents in total have died in office (4 assassinations and 4 natural causes), which over 235 years gives you about a 3.4% chance per year. On the one hand most of those deaths came during a time when medical care was nowhere near as advanced as now; on the other hand Biden's already several years older than any previous President, and next month Trump will be older than Reagan was on his last day in office.

[Brett Bellmore]

And I already said they both have higher odds of dying per year than your 3.4%, just based on actuary tables.

BTW, it's true that they had lousy medicine at the time, but it's also true that if you made it to Trump's age in that era, you were a tough SOB whose odds of dying were pretty low.

[Sarcastr0]

You acknowledge the table's odds are not really properly applicable to either of these people.

And yet you still cite them.

[Brett Bellmore]

I used the best data I had to evaluate a silly bet. You're mad because I brought numbers to the table?

[bernard11]

McKinley and Garfield might well have survived with modern medicine, Lincoln and Kennedy not so much.

In an earlier age Reagan might not have survived his wounds.

[Dr. Ed 2]

Try this: Trump is in prison -- and WINS.

Trump not only pardons himself and the Jan 8, but also issues a blanket pardon to any citizen "assisting" an illegal alien into leaving the country. We could see something right out of the 1920s...

[Martinned2]

Not if he's convicted under state law he won't.

Which raises an interesting variation of what we were talking about the other day. Regardless of whether you think a state should be able to prosecute the President while he's in office, presumably it's a closer question whether they're required to let him out if he's been prosecuted before he was elected?

[Dr. Ed 2]

The President has the power of disbursement -- and could legally block all welfare and SSI funds earmarked to the state. He could close all the state's highways. He could do a lot to a state.

[Krychek_2]

If Trump is in prison, and is elected, I don't think he would be permitted to act as president. I think the 25th Amendment would be invoked and whoever is vice president -- or Speaker of the House, or President Pro Tem of the Senate -- would take over. And he would remain in prison.

It's also possible, since we have that idiotic institution known as the electoral college, that there could be an agreement among Republican electors to simply vote for someone else. In most states they are not required to vote for the candidate that won the state. So maybe Nikki Haley or Ron DeSantis gets to be president after all.

[Martinned2]

I don't see how that would work. I don't see how being in prison would prevent the President from writing to the President pro tempore of the Senate and the Speaker of the House of Representatives that no inability exists.

[Brett Bellmore]

I agree. "Being in prison" isn't any basis for saying a President can't execute his office.

This is not to say that something hinky like a refusal to deliver the letter or maybe accept it might not happen under those circumstances. Political norms have been falling like tenpins lately, and a strike isn't out of the question.

[Krychek_2]

He can write the letter, but Congress would then decide if he is "unable" to discharge his powers and duties. And I think even a Republican Congress would likely conclude that if he's in prison, he's unable to exercise his powers and duties, especially since they'd be glad to be rid of him.

The procedural wrinkle would be that the initial notice that he's unable would come from the vice president and a majority of the cabinet. I assume that members of the Cabinet do not automatically lose their jobs on January 20 and would still be able to function. But who knows, this is uncharted territory.

[Martinned2]

I think even a Republican Congress would likely conclude that if he’s in prison, he’s unable to exercise his powers and duties, especially since they’d be glad to be rid of him.

I think I've spotted where our views diverge.

[David Nieporent]

+1.

[Krychek_2]

I suppose it's a reasonable question just how far Congressional Republicans would go to stand with Trump. There must be an outer limit, right? Maybe I'm still giving them too much credit. But seriously, is the Pentagon going to station an officer outside his cell with nuclear launch codes?

[Brett Bellmore]

I think you would need, not a conviction, but a conviction on some charge Republicans actually thought was real, and not just lawfare.

[Krychek_2]

But no Republican is going to believe any charge against Trump is legitimate, or at least won't say so in public.

[Brett Bellmore]

"But no Republican is going to believe any charge against Trump is legitimate, or at least won’t say so in public."

Oh, I can think of plenty of charges you could legitimately bring against Trump, and Republicans would admit they were legitimate. The problem is that he'd have to actually commit crimes he hasn't committed to plausibly bring them. The guy stupidly said that he could shoot somebody on 5th Avenue and his supporters wouldn't care. I think he's wrong about that, but the fact remains:

He hasn't shot anybody on 5th avenue.

[Krychek_2]

If he did shoot someone on Fifth Avenue, his supporters would deny he did it, before then saying he did it but it wasn't illegal, before then saying that it was illegal but what about Hillary's emails. He could be caught accepting suitcases of cash from Putin and it would be the same thing. I think the one thing he's told the truth about is that yes, he really could shoot someone on Fifth Avenue, and his supporters wouldn't care. Which means a lot of GOP Congressmen wouldn't either.

[bernard11]

Oh, I can think of plenty of charges you could legitimately bring against Trump, and Republicans would admit they were legitimate.

There may be a handful, but by and large Republicans are going to deny that pretty much any charge is legitimate. All you have to do is read the comment threads on this blog to understand that.

Brett, when I refer to you and others as cultists, I mean it. It's not a figure of speech. The level of devotion to Trump is astonishing, and can be explained no other way.

[Brett Bellmore]

"There may be a handful, but by and large Republicans are going to deny that pretty much any charge is legitimate."

Come up with a charge that doesn't rely on a novel legal theory, or accusations of misconduct on an unknown date many years earlier, and you'll have more success.

[Sarcastr0]

LOL no, no one will ever have any luck.

The GOP, and you along with them have demonstrated that you will misapprehend the law or delude yourself on the facts as required to declare whatever new charge illegitimate.

You did a bit of it right here, in fact!

[bernard11]

The classified documents business easily meets your requirements, Brett.

[Brett Bellmore]

” but Congress would then decide if he is “unable” to discharge his powers and duties.”

Sure, and if they decide that by a 2/3 vote in both chambers, it would actually be legally valid.

I seriously don't understand why people keep going on about using the 25th amendment against Presidents they don't like. Impeachment actually requires fewer votes!

[Bob from Ohio]

"they’d be glad to be rid of him."

LOL He was just elected but about half of the GOPers in both Houses would be willing to piss off their voters and thereby take a match to their re-election and careers. Yes, sure.

Drinking in the morning can be fun but don't over do it!

[Kazinski]

You'd have a federal court order him released as his federal appeal on the state charges winds thru the courts, and then delay the case for four years.

I doubt the Georgia trial will be held before the election.

The NY charges are too sketchy to survive federal examination.

Its going to be a series of long, long shots.

But It does underline the importance of Trump's VP selection, which is already pretty important because of his age.

[Noscitur a sociis]

his federal appeal on the state charges

I know a lot about the law. And various other lawyerings.

[not guilty]

"You’d have a federal court order him released as his federal appeal on the state charges winds thru the courts, and then delay the case for four years."

Kazinski, do you have any authority for that proposition? Federal courts exercise only such jurisdiction as Congress authorizes. Which federal court would issue such a release order as you contemplate? Pursuant to what federal statute(s)?

HINT: You may want to look at Younger v. Harris, 401 U.S. 37 (1971), and 28 U.S.C. § 1257(a).

[Krychek_2]

Oh come now, it would be no more frivolous than a lot of other stuff Trump's lawyers have filed.

[not guilty]

I don't at all doubt that Trump's lawyers would ask. But Kazinski posited that some federal court would actually order the release of a state criminal defendant "as his federal appeal on the state charges winds thru the courts" [emphasis added]. There is no federal appeal of a state court conviction other than review by SCOTUS of the final judgment or decree rendered by the highest court of a State in which a decision could be had.

[not guilty]

Kazinski, where do you get the notion that a federal court can order a state criminal defendant released as his federal appeal on the state charges winds thru the courts? From Otto Yourazz?

I realize that some commenters on this blog are wont to make shit up as they go along, but have the stones to admit it when called out.

[not guilty]

Still waiting, Kazinski.

[Kazinski]

Well I did see this see this at US Courts:

“U.S. appellate courts have jurisdiction over cases that allege violations of federal constitutional rights, regardless of whether the alleged violations involve federal, state, or local governments. Thus, appeals based on constitutional grounds permit federal court review of state and local laws, practices, and court rulings, not just direct appeals of federal cases.”

It certainly doesn’t say they can’t, especially the President Elect of the United States of America.

But as I’ve said before, I don’t even think Merchan is going to buy Braggs legal theory.

Did you see Stormies Attorneys testimony today denying there was a a “hush” money payment?

And also for the record, I don’t monitor the threads here 24 hours a day, but I thank you for your service in that mostly thankless job.

[not guilty]

That has absolutely nothing to do with a federal court ordering the release of a state prisoner during the pendency of his appeal from a state court conviction.

It also has nothing to do with a federal court conducting an appeal of a state court criminal conviction, as you posited. The only federal court with jurisdiction to review a state conviction on appeal is SCOTUS, and that can happen only with regard to a final judgment or decree rendered by the highest court of a State in which a decision could be had. Prior to that final judgment or decree in the state court system, SCOTUS lacks jurisdiction to act.

(Federal collateral review of state court convictions is available under 28 U.S.C. § 2254, but a habeas corpus petitioner must first exhaust the remedies available in the courts of the State there as well.)

[Krychek_2]

I will also say, as if it needed to be said, that if Trump cared about anyone other than himself he would spare the country the damage that would come from having to go through such a scenario in the first place. Imagine the damage Russia, China and Iran could do in the few days that it was unsettled who was president.

But he doesn't care about anyone other than himself, he would absolutely be willing to put the country through that, and that's Reason No. 172 why he is totally unfit for the office.

[Zarniwoop]

I'm sure I'm not the first to think of this, but I can't recall much discussion: what if DJT is unable to attend the swearing-in ceremony on Jan. 20, and the VP-elect is the only one sworn in?

Hm, I guess my first assumption is that there wouldn't be a final judgment and sentence, so DJT is unlikely to be actually incarcerated on Jan. 20. But pre-sentence incarceration can happen (especially with defendant who tries to piss off a judge).

[not guilty]

Attending the ceremony is not a prerequisite of taking the oath of office. Lyndon B. Johnson took the oath in 1963 aboard Air Force One at Love Field in Dallas, Texas.

[David Nieporent]

Attending the ceremony is not a prerequisite of taking the oath of office.

Sure, but one does need to be sworn in somewhere to exercise the powers of the office. (A president who doesn't take the oath is still the president, but not able to exercise the office.) Are there lots of judges or notaries public in prison?

[santamonica811]

They'd send the appropriate person/people to him, in that case. 100% for sure. It's a fun game to think about. But I think that pretty much everyone agrees that, for any of the criminal cases, IF there is a conviction, he'd--at most--be sentenced to some version of house arrest. Maybe a modest, secure, apartment in some federal building, where he'd be absolutely safe from attack, while still secure in the sense of restricting his movement, restricting his use of TV, cell phones, etc..

It's an interesting question: If someone is elected president while in custody, and if the normal rule is, say, "No phone or internet access except for one hour per day.", would the house arrest restrictions have to be lifted for this one person? Or would these neutrally-applied restrictions be allowed by the Sup. Ct to continue? (In which case, of course, the 25th would be invoked, as there's no way anyone could be president if not accessible 24 hours a day.)

My next screenplay is just writing itself. 🙂

[David Nieporent]

Maybe a modest, secure, apartment in some federal building, where he’d be absolutely safe from attack, while still secure in the sense of restricting his movement, restricting his use of TV, cell phones, etc..

Gitmo!

[darkknight9]

In the realm of fantastical thoughts I had one entertaining design float through my brainpan regarding punishment.

What if they gave him a work release? Home at night/in morning then commute, work and then home?

"Okay where do you live?"
"The White House, I just need to get my drivers license changed."
"Okay, where do you work?"
"Well, *technically I work for and represent the entirety of the United States of America."

I imagine the most positive thing that could come from such an arrangement would be the sighs of relief coming from the rest of the worlds leaders when his monitoring device wont let him leave the US. 🙂

Just my imagination.

[Kazinski]

He could have a fellow prisoner swear him.

Or one of the many MAGA guards .

[ducksalad]

Precedent already set with LBJ’s swearing in by a federal judge on an aircraft. Any federal district judge, and maybe any judge at all, can administer the oath of office, and it does not have to be at the capital.
Edit: Sorry NG. Slow typer...

[Zarniwoop]

excellent point, both of youse. Guess I should have had morning coffee first.

[Mr. Bumble]

I think Calvin Coolidge was sworn in by his father, a justice of the peace.

[Bob from Ohio]

Also a Notary Public

Wikipedia says a second secret swearing in was done by a federal judge at the urging of the AG.

Constitution just says oath. silent on who does so I don't see why a NY notary or state judge couldn't do it. Washington's oath was administered by Robert R. Livingston, the Chancellor of New York.

[Brett Bellmore]

The President himself takes the oath. It doesn't actually say anywhere that somebody else has to administer it.

[ducksalad]

1. I'm a big fan of the 25th Amendment but the one essential step is the vice president signing off. Trump's #1, and perhaps sole, criteria for picking a VP candidate will be personal loyalty. The VP can take office independently of the POTUS, isn't subject to the 25th themselves, and can't be removed except by impeachment.
2. I doubt merely being in prison will cause the electors to change their votes. The electors, especially this time, will be loyalists who think the charges are bullshit.
3. Any US district judge could go to the prison and administer the oath of office. It only takes one and he's appointed dozens.
4. Even if New York state decides to put Trump in welded door solitary with no access to communication devices and punitive suspension of family visitation privileges, he still has a right to talk with his lawyer and sign papers brought by the lawyer. The lawyer can transmit instructions, and bring bills and EOs to sign.

[David Nieporent]

4. Even if New York state decides to put Trump in welded door solitary with no access to communication devices and punitive suspension of family visitation privileges, he still has a right to talk with his lawyer and sign papers brought by the lawyer. The lawyer can transmit instructions, and bring bills and EOs to sign.

I realize that this is a silly, just-for-funsies hypo and therefore analyzing it too deeply risks getting into "It's just a show; I really should relax" territory, but this proposal of yours does not seem realistic. (It would be nice to live in a country where the president's role is so limited that this could work, but it's not our current one.) The president cannot discharge his de facto obligations through occasionally meeting with a lawyer and signing some papers.

[ducksalad]

I dunno man, the lawyer could visit several times a week.

Wilson pulled it off for months after a major stroke that left him paralyzed and unable to communicate coherently.

Garfield did it for like 10 weeks while gutshot, running a high fever, and choosing between unimaginable pain and being doped on primitive opiods.

[Balisane]

What he should do is have the military just go in and do what it needs to do. I'm sure it wouldn't be hard to convince good patriotic conservative white soldiers from the heartland to wreak havoc on Sodom cities like New York or San Francisco.

[not guilty]

"What he should do is have the military just go in and do what it needs to do."

What in particular do you contend that the military needs to do, Balisane?

[Zarniwoop]

probably participate in some hot male scenes, to provide some more fantasy material to spam the VC with. And I bet he just loves the idea of men in uniform.

[Stella Link the dog]

I've never in my life encountered a straight man so obsessed with vivid images of gay men having sex as some of the posters here. It is really strange behavior. Pretty much Jerry Falwell, Jr level of strange -- maybe stranger.

[not guilty]

Or perhaps Ted Haggard level?

[Stella Link the dog]

Or Larry Craig or Jimmy Swaggart. Of course, sexual inclinations that appear strange to me are not limited to those on the right.

[Brett Bellmore]

I'm having a hard time picturing Trump winning the Presidency and not getting a Republican Congress.

The Democrats are defending 23 seats this fall, compared to 11 for the Republicans, and several of those 23 are in states Trump carried in 2020. While that's hardly decisive, it does make it uphill for the Democrats.

The House is more complicated, as a number of Republican incumbents are retiring this year, and the Democrats have won themselves some crucial gerrymanders in court. But the House tends to follow the Presidential elections.

So I expect Trump, if elected, to come into office with a Republican Congress. He should be able to get legislation to aid him.

[santamonica811]

It wouldn't shock me at all to have Trump win, R's take the Senate by a 2-6 margin, and Dems take the house by 10+. In fact, I think that's the consensus right now (with Trump: Biden being almost a coin flip as of May 2024).

Unless this unexpectedly turns into a wave election; I think it's overwhelmingly likely to be a divided govt come 2025. Abortion will prevent the House from going Rep. And the number of vulnerable Dem Senate seats they have to defend will prevent the D's from keeping the Senate. (Although my Republican party will do its best to screw things up by nominating really idiotic and extreme candidates whenever possible, alas.)

[Dr. Ed 2]

It wouldn't take that -- merely closing the NY airspace would do it.

[Stella Link the dog]

What is he going to do, go from tower to tower and assassinate all the controllers?

[bernard11]

Would do what, other than plunge the country into a depression that likely would get him impeached and convicted?

I mean, if the GOP let him get away with that the country is gone anyway.

[David Nieporent]

The President has the power of disbursement — and could legally block all welfare and SSI funds earmarked to the state.

No, he can't. He has no such legal authority. Congress, not the president, decides who gets federal funds, except to the extent Congress has vested the president with some discretion (such as in federal contracting).

[Balisane]

You leftists didn't seem to have an issue with Biden giving out taxpayer money to his constituents.

[loki13]

.... You just called DMN a leftist?

Wow. Things have really changed in the last few years.

[Stella Link the dog]

"He could do a lot to a state."

Actually, he can't. The only way a president can do much more than wipe his own ass (or fill in his own burrow) is by convincing someone under his authority to do it and convincing the courts to not block it.

Anyway, even if convicted, Trump isn't going to jail and even if under any circumstances he were to try to "do a lot to a state," he wouldn't be successful.

[Krayt]

And when faced with pardoning himself under federal law, the people not prosecuting him as a political enemy made sure to send investigative results to states just in case.

[Nige]

Wow they are cunning. But also weirdly slow and indecisive about definitely and shamelessly jailing this political enemy of theirs.

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

.

Not if he’s convicted under state law he won’t.

He likely would try. And the Federalist Society and Volokh Conspiracy would strive to conjure a legal argument for it.

[Sarcastr0]

Using the pardon power to instantiate American pogroms is not going to happen.

Blood and soil is where you are, Ed, but it is not what we are.

[Brett Bellmore]

Actually, I was just reading a Time interview with Trump, (Refreshingly, they published the whole transcript, it wasn't a few paraphrases with occasional words in quotes.) and there's actually a pretty clear implication on Trump's part that he plans mass pardons as an element of his mass deportation program, to protect the people carrying it out from lawfare.

[Sarcastr0]

Between his any citizen, and his “assisting” that's not what Ed was contemplating.

But your scenario that would be pretty bad, if you think our three-branched system of checks and balances matters at all to our republic.

[Brett Bellmore]

I'm not at all fond of the idea of mass pardons. Frankly, I think the pardon power is used in too many cases where it shouldn't, and too few where it should, and the idea of promising pardons for actions not yet taken? It should properly result in impeachment. Can you get any more contrary to the President's obligation to take care that the law be executed, than promising in advance not to?

So don't think I'm endorsing the idea, I'm just confirming that he seems to be considering it.

[Dr. Ed 2]

See 269 MGL 1 & 2

[kramartini]

Not gonna happen in NY since, as has been established elsewhere, it is unlikely that Bragg will be able to prove that records related to Trump's payments from his personal funds to his personal lawyer for personal services constitute "business records" of the Trump Organization under New York Penal Law § 175.00.

[Sarcastr0]

"as has been established elsewhere."

Come on, dude.

[kramartini]

I meant by me on last open thread.

[bernard11]

issues a blanket pardon to any citizen “assisting” an illegal alien into leaving the country.

Aside from the sheer idiocy and immorality of this suggestion, it also won't work.

Much of the "assistance" you have in mind would be state crimes.

[Moderation4ever]

First off no one should ever wish for death is correct. There is a reality that we have two very old candidates who are closer to the end of their lives than to the beginning. That said most ex-President these days live a long time. Doubt that and I will remind you that Jimmy Carter is still in hospice care.

An interesting question is how fast and how large would the conspiracies spring up if one of these two died?

[Mr. Bumble]

Would depend on the circumstances.

[Sarcastr0]

I already blame Big Cashew.

[Magister]

Ha! But I'm pretty sure you could work all sorts of nuts into the theory.

[David Nieporent]

ISWYDT.

[darkknight9]

Hee hee! 😀 😀

[Moderation4ever]

Really? Justice Anthony Scalia died in his sleep and there were conspiracy stories springing up.

[Mr. Bumble]

I was responding to: "how fast and how large".

[Brett Bellmore]

Didn't help that initial reports mistakenly said he had a pillow over his head. But the real mistake was blowing off the autopsy.

[Gasman]

No one wants an untimely death. So presumably wishing for someone to have a timely death is fully in keeping with a generous spirit.
So, all things considered, what would be the most timely death for each candidate? opinions may vary.

[Bored Lawyer]

"That said most ex-President these days live a long time. Doubt that and I will remind you that Jimmy Carter is still in hospice care."

Living and being capable of functioning as president are two different things. Do you think Jimmy Carter in his current state could function as president?

[Stella Link the dog]

Carter? Better than Trump.

[Nige]

'They give birth astride the grave.' Everyone falls in eventually.

[not guilty]

In the District of Columbia prosecution of Donald Trump, the question presented before SCOTUS is "whether and if so to what extent does a former President enjoy presidential immunity from criminal prosecution for conduct alleged to involve official acts during his tenure in office." Much of last week's oral argument focused on distinguishing between official acts, which are arguably subject to immunity from prosecution, and personal or private conduct, which is not.

Counsel for Trump had the following exchange with Justice Amy Coney Bear It:

JUSTICE BARRETT: So you concede that private acts don't get immunity?

MR. SAUER: We do.

JUSTICE BARRETT: Okay. So, in the Special Counsel's brief on pages 46 and 47, he urges us, even if we assume that there was -- even if we were to decide or assume that there was some sort of immunity for official acts, that there were sufficient private acts in the indictment for the trial to go -- for the case to go back and the trial to begin immediately. And I want to know if you agree or disagree about the characterization of these acts as private. Petitioner turned to a private attorney, he was willing to spread knowingly false claims of election fraud to spearhead his challenges to the election results. Private?

MR. SAUER: As alleged. I mean, we dispute the allegation, but --

JUSTICE BARRETT: Of course.

MR. SAUER: -- that sounds private to me.

JUSTICE BARRETT: Sounds private? Petitioner conspired with another private attorney who caused the filing in court of a verification signed by Petitioner that contained false allegations to support a challenge. Private?

MR. SAUER: That also sounds private.

JUSTICE BARRETT: Three private actors, two attorneys, including those mentioned above, and a political consultant helped implement a plan to submit fraudulent slates of presidential electors to obstruct the certification proceeding, and Petitioner and a co-conspirator attorney directed that effort.

MR. SAUER: You read it quickly. I believe --

JUSTICE BARRETT: Yeah.

MR. SAUER: -- that's private. I don't want to --

JUSTICE BARRETT: So those acts, you would not dispute those were private, and you wouldn't raise a claim that they were official?

MR. SAUER: As characterized.

Whether the case is remanded to the lower courts or not, if the courts accept these concessions by Trump's counsel, this case will (eventually) go to trial before a jury.

[Commenter_XY]

Justice Barrett got to the heart of the matter, quickly; she does that a lot. With 8 kids, totally understandable. She neatly summarized the private acts here. That was a nice find in the transcript.

Practically speaking, is it even possible to find an unbiased jury in the US when it comes to POTUS Trump for a trial? I have never seen a political figure like POTUS Trump who polarized the electorate to this degree (possible exception for John Jay).

[not guilty]

Well, a jury was seated quickly and efficiently in Manhattan.

The constitutional standard of fairness requires that a defendant have "a panel of impartial, `indifferent' jurors." Irvin v. Dowd, 366 U.S. 717, 722 (1961). Qualified jurors need not, however, be totally ignorant of the facts and issues involved. Murphy v. Florida, 421 U.S. 794, 799-800 (1975).

"To hold that the mere existence of any preconceived notion as to the guilt or innocence of an accused, without more, is sufficient to rebut the presumption of a prospective juror's impartiality would be to establish an impossible standard. It is sufficient if the juror can lay aside his impression or opinion and render a verdict based on the evidence presented in court."

Murphy, at 800, quoting Irwin, at 723. Furthermore, a prospective juror's familiarity with the accused is not disqualifying absent predisposition:

We must distinguish between mere familiarity with petitioner or his past and an actual predisposition against him, just as we have in the past distinguished largely factual publicity from that which is invidious or inflammatory. e.g., Beck v. Washington, 369 U.S. 541, 556 (1962). To ignore these real differences in the potential for prejudice would not advance the cause of fundamental fairness, but only make impossible the timely prosecution of persons who are well known in the community, whether they be notorious or merely prominent.

Murphy, at 800, fn. 4.

[Brett Bellmore]

Biden got 86% of the vote in Manhattan, not quite as one sided as DC, but nearly. And party registration is a public record in NY, don't need any special procedure to find it out.

So, if the prosecutor wanted to use his challenges in that way, he could have eliminated every known Republican from the jury.

Not saying it happened, obviously I don't know the identity of the jurors. Just that it's something that can be done when the local jury pool is that tilted.

[Mr. Bumble]

For a case in point, see the E. Jean Carrol jury.

[Balisane]

What was the makeup of that jury? Other than 6 men, 3 women, I couldn't find any info.

[Brett Bellmore]

That's still secret, but the principle applies: It would have been very easy to make sure of a jury with no Republicans on it.

[bernard11]

How easy, Brett?

Could you explain the selection process, so we can understand and evaluate your claim?

And while we're talking about claims, could you provide some support for your claim that all Democrats would automatically rule against Trump?

This stuff you spew out is ridiculous. It's pure paranoia.

[Brett Bellmore]

Sheesh, I'm not going to play this game. Preemptory challeges are a thing, and if you know which jurors you want rid of, and they're few enough, you can be rid of them.

Does an all Democrat jury guarantee conviction? Not theoretically, any more than an all white jury guarantees a black man will be convicted.

[bernard11]

I doubt you know a damn thing about the Carroll jury, who was in the pool, who was disqualified or stricken, and why.

You're just making shit up because you can't accept that Trump did anything wrong...ever.

[Armchair]

I'm of the opinion that if more than 60% of the jury pool is disqualified for unacceptable bias, the jury pool of the entire district is essentially tainted, and the trial should be moved to a different district.

[Martinned2]

Or you could just do a bench trial. They would both equally violate the 6th amendment.

[Brett Bellmore]

A bench trial would only violate the 6th amendment if the defendant actually wanted a jury trial...

[Martinned2]

Yes, that was implied. What I don't know is whether the defendant can waive the "district" requirement of the 6th amendment.

[not guilty]

A criminal defendant can waive the Sixth Amendment State and district wherein the crime shall have been committed requirement by moving for a change of venue.

A defendant can waive his Sixth Amendment right to trial by jury. It's not a constitutional requirement, but Rule 23(a) of the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure specifies that if the defendant is entitled to a jury trial, the trial must be by jury unless: (1) the defendant waives a jury trial in writing; (2) the government consents; and (3) the court approves.

[Martinned2]

That government consent part has always annoyed me. (If I was an actual defendant who asked for a bench trial and was refused I'd be more than just annoyed.)

[Noscitur a sociis]

I have not guilty on ignore but I gather from the responses we're talking about the state case? In which case, the Sixth Amendment district requirement doesn't apply, whereas the jury trial right does. (Obviously the trial would have to be in New York. But the federal constitution doesn't require it to be in any particular place in New York.)

[Balisane]

What good is that if you get a judge like Engoron or Merchan?

[Jason Cavanaugh]

In other words: You don't understand math

[bernard11]

Why?

[Sonja T]

https://www.nationalreview.com/corner/what-happens-when-the-law-and-the-indictment-do-not-state-what-the-crime-is/

good analysis as to why the NY indictment is BS

[Commenter_XY]

NG, you are correct. A jury was seated quickly and efficiently in Manhattan. 🙂

It is the impartial and indifferent aspect that I wonder about in that jury....is it really possible to be impartial and indifferent given the 24/7/365 media coverage of POTUS Trump and events of the last 8 years? How does the law address a situation where an impartial and indifferent body of jurors in a particular location is simply not possible (for whatever reason)?

[Sonja T]

Some cities it is near impossible to get an impartial jury, especially with a politically charged subject

Trial of Trump in NYC or DC - near impossible to get anything other than guilty as charged irrespective of the evidence - Just the opposite with HRC ( using her for illustration purposes only, and assuming she did something comparable to trump) innocent irrespective of the evidence.

Upstate NY, there is enough of a mix of political parties that you would get a reasonably unbiased jury.

[Jason Cavanaugh]

As previously explained to you: There is no such thing as "POTUS" Trump.

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

Maybe he's getting that from a book of fairy tales he is gullible enough to believe to be true?

Or, more likely, just a sign of disaffectedness and ignorance.

[Mr. Bumble]

The concessions are qualified by: MR. SAUER: As characterized.

[Michael P]

Sure, but that just means the prosecutor needs to use that characterization in the criminal complaint (or whatever the term is). Then it goes to trial with the most biased jury that the prosecutor can find.

[Mr. Bumble]

Predictions are difficult, especially about the future but it doesn't look like Jack "Killer Eyes" Smith will be going to trial before the election.

[Stephen Lathrop]

Whether the case is remanded to the lower courts or not, if the courts accept these concessions by Trump’s counsel, this case will (eventually) go to trial before a jury.

Not if Trump wins the election. Or loses the election, but seizes power anyway.

Moreover, everyone, on both sides, is in agreement that the likelihood of either possibility will increase if Trump is not tried prior to the election. Thus, the fraught question remains whether Trump can be tried before the election, so the electorate can cast an informed vote.

The hope that anything like a trial can happen seems rapidly to be dwindling toward a mere possibility that some kind of protracted evidentiary hearing in Judge Chutkan's court can be made to look like a trial. Given that Trump's base will remain in deepest denial, lack of a verdict will vitiate even that possibility as a political influence.

Also, it will be interesting to see what kind handcuffs SCOTUS puts on Chutkan. I doubt the Trump majority wants her at liberty to compel testimony efficiently. Expect every pro-Trump witness subpoenaed to delay, and to due-process their way out of testifying, with SCOTUS support as needed.

[Brett Bellmore]

There is essentially zero chance of Trump "seizing power" if he loses the election. How the hell is he supposed to do that? He only had shallow control over the Executive branch when he was legitimately President, the bureaucracy actively thwarted him on a routine basis, the State Department admits to feeding him false information. And Biden will have had 4 years to finish up the political purge of the military leadership that Obama got started.

The idea that Trump could "seize" power is more of a joke than the idea that he could have carried out a coup last time around, and that was laughable itself. Anything that could even semi-plausibly be characterized as an attempt to seize power, they'd cap his ass.

We are not, at present, the sort of country where you can "seize power".

Yes, if Trump gets elected, it will be pardons all around. If he loses, Biden might pardon him anyway, because the need for lawfare against him will have passed, and the prosecutions might be considered a liability in terms of political stability.

[Sarcastr0]

Russian Roulette, even with very good odds, is not a great game.

[Brett Bellmore]

And yet it's our lives, as any actuary table will tell you.

[Sarcastr0]

Wouldn't just be actuarial tables of the chamber comes up bad on Trump seizing power without electoral imprimatur.

[Brett Bellmore]

Look, Trump seizing power if he loses is Democratic fan fiction, get over it.

[Sarcastr0]

I said I think the odds are very low.

I also don’t want to play Russian Roulette even if the odds of a bullet are very low.

[Brett Bellmore]

You're not playing Russian Roulette. You're reading Russian Roulette fan fiction.

[Stephen Lathrop]

A right-wing SCOTUS majority seems to be playing Russian Roulette. We will know for certain when we see what they say about immunity, or maybe before then, if they take too long to say it.

[Commenter_XY]

The odds are zero that POTUS Trump loses the election and magically stages a successful coup where he takes power anyway, and the country is good with it. AYFKM? Get real.

Absent POTUS Biden fucking up royally or becoming incapacitated, he will very likely win re-election. That said, the election comes down to GA, WI and AZ. Those three states decide the election.

[Nige]

Still dodging around the question of what he will TRY to do.

[Balisane]

You also forgot that there were plenty of Democrat judges happy to issue nationwide junctions based on spurious interpretations of the Administrative Procedures Act.

[Nige]

Trump is the one person whose actions, words and intentions are all selectively discounted in service of dismissing criticism against him and ignoring his obviously authoritarian nature. 'Zero chance of him seizing power if he loses' is such a great fucking phrase. Leaves plenty of space for all sorts of bad things to happen.

[bernard11]

There is essentially zero chance of Trump “seizing power” if he loses the election.

Maybe, but there is essentially a 100% chance he will try.

And your crap about political purges of the military is more evidence of your mental illness.

Just stop spewing that shit.

[SimonP]

You’re playing word games, Brett.

The way Trump could attempt to “seize power” in 2024 is to run the same play he did in 2020, which wasn’t to convince the military to take over and install him as Emperor, but rather to create enough noise over the certified results that electoral ballots get disputed/tossed and the selection of President goes to the House, which can then hand him the White House before the full story comes out.

I realize that the dodge you’re playing here is, “Well, that wouldn’t count as ‘seizing power’.” But that’s what people are talking about. A so-called “legal coup.”

[VinniUSMC]

You post this word salad BS and accuse Brett of playing word games? You're not very bright Simple Simon.

[SimonP]

Hooah!

[Drewski]

I guess there's a reason they don't call it the United States Reading Comprehension Corps. It only looks like word salad if you struggle with three-syllable words. Maybe you could find someone to read it to you.

[Brett Bellmore]

So, you've reduced "seizing power" to "contesting the election results, and prevailing"?

[SimonP]

No, but your response sufficiently demonstrates my point.

[bernard11]

Right.

Brett is unwilling to admit that challenging results in court is not what people are worried about or even much complaining about (unless Aileen Cannon or some toady like her is the judge).

The issue is using force to try to do it, like his gang of thugs did on Jan. 6, or making voting difficult in Democratic areas.

Don't try your usual BS of trying to conflate normal legal actions with a violent attempt to disrupt electoral proceedings, just because you can lump them under the same name.

As I said above, there is nothing you won't defend.

[kramartini]

How many counts will go to trial? The counts related to "obstruction of an official proceeding" may not make it to trial after Fischer v. US.

[not guilty]

Even if Joseph Fischer succeeds before SCOTUS, the D.C. prosecution of Donald Trump is unlikely to be affected. The gist of Mr. Fischer's argument is that the scope of 18 U.S.C. § 1512(c)(2) is limited by § 1512(c)(1) to conduct similar to that prohibited by § 1512(c)(1), that is, conduct involving corruptly obstructing, impeding or influencing an official proceeding (or attempting to do so) with regard to a record, document, or other object with the intent to impair the object’s integrity or availability.

The § 1512(c)(2) and 1512(k) counts of the Trump indictment involve the fraudulent creation and transmission of documents intended to obstruct or influence the electoral count by Congress -- the fake elector slates. That is conduct similar to that prohibited by § 1512(c)(1).

[Dr. Ed 2]

I'm taking odds on how long it will be before one of the Hamas Fan Club members manages to find a buried underground electrical line with a tent stake and gets electrocuted.

[Brett Bellmore]

What, on a college campus? Forever, they wouldn't be buried remotely that shallow.

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

Speaking of college campuses . . . and campus improvement projects . . . nine more days!

[loki13]

I mean this in all seriousness, Dr. Ed.

Have you even considered what has happened to you, in your life, that you have come to the point of wishing death on so many fellow Americans for having the temerity of disagreeing with you?

I think that there are a lot of foolish people out there with a lot of ill-informed opinions. I see them every day- not just here and in random internet comments, but expressed to my face by clients. And the thing is- I don't wish death upon them.

People have opinions. Sometimes really bad and ill-conceived ones. For example, you happen to have a lot of terrible opinions that you express regularly. But I wouldn't wish death on you. I'm sure (well, maybe not THAT sure) that you must not be this bad in real life, and that you might actually do something good on occasion that doesn't involve politics. And that you might have people that would be sad if you died.

So, maybe consider that this isn't a good look. Remember- if someone is alive, they might always change their terrible opinions (even you, Dr. Ed, even you). But death forecloses the possibility of change.

[Jerry B.]

Sometime read the comments on any Washington Post story about a natural disaster in a Red state. It's not pretty.

[Brett Bellmore]

Seriously, if you ever doubt that concentration camps could return to America, read the WaPo's comments. Scary!

[Sarcastr0]

If you ever want to become a paranoiac, take Internet comments seriously.

From reading this Dr. Ed guy I think America's on the verge of some kinda trucker-based civil war!

[Brett Bellmore]

Since we've already had concentration camps in America in (Barely, at this point.) living memory, it scarcely requires paranoia to think we could have them again.

[Sarcastr0]

We had a lot of things in the 1940s I'm not concerned about today. Society changes a lot in 80 years!

[Stella Link the dog]

"Society changes a lot in 80 years!"

Indeed. But look how much it's changed in the last 10, back when I was a right wing Republican.

[Nige]

If you doubt it, read that Time interview.

[bernard11]

If you ever doubt that concentration camps could return to America, listen to Trump's speeches and the cheers they get. Or read Dr Ed.

On second thought, Ed doesn't want camps, he just wants to kill everyone he dislikes.

[Sarcastr0]

To be fair, Ed is an outlier even among the right wing bomb-throwers around here.

[loki13]

If your first reaction to any post is, "Look at what other people (that I disagree with) are doing!!!!!!" I would posit that, well, you're doing it wrong.

You can't measure your own values by the worst of other people (either real or imaginary). If "the other side" is a bunch of child molesters, that doesn't mean you should do it as well.

If you look at my post, you might notice while I was addressing it to Dr. Ed (who has a well-earned reputation for wishing death upon people, and this is just the most recent example), I didn't take particular sides. Wishing death on people because they have different opinions than you, regardless of what their opinions are, is a bad place to be. Maybe we've all been there at some point, but it's not a good place to be.

[Jerry B.]

Just pointing out that people on all sides often wish death and destruction on their supposed political enemies. And I realize that the anonymity of the internet makes it easy to say things you'd never say face to face.

[loki13]

I do think that the internet in general (and anonymity is a part of it, but only a part of it) has lead to a coarsening of the discourse.

As a general rule, people are much more civil and kinder when they are interacting in person. Because you see each other as complete people, not just as some embodiment of "the other."

That said, I also happen to think that the internet discourse and way of thinking (along with some COVID-era hangover) has spread to real life.

People need to relax, a little, instead of seeking out constant opportunities to anger up the blood.

[Mr. Bumble]

"As a general rule, people are much more civil and kinder when they are interacting in person. Because you see each other as complete people, not just as some embodiment of “the other.”"
See current college campus demonstrations.

[Bwaaah]

Watch the protestors as they stand together. They do this in the face of opposition, often quite literally. Shoulder to shoulder, they stand looking dead-eyed at those they target, those who disagree.

It’s an unusual behavior of humans who are socially engaged, as they are, and yet casting masses of other people as being undeserving of standing among them, undeserving of equitable consideration, undeserving of attention to anything else, undeserving even of passage.

Think of how billions of unassuming strangers make their ways in cities and towns every day, walking and working by and between and with each other, without conflict. Billions of strangers, interacting with each other, without conflict. How?

Deference…common human deference. We try to avoid getting in the way of strangers. We try to avoid issues with strangers. If we can’t avoid an issue, we try to avoid escalation and conflict. We, strangers, usually, helpfully, importantly, offer a measure of deference to each other. Deference is perhaps the most prevalent way in which people reach for peace; try to extend some measure of peace; try to avoid conflict.

We typically give each other deference, especially strangers, for the obvious benefit of avoiding conflict.

The argument of the protestors is that there is a fundamental moral question here on which there can be no equivocation. Do you center the plight of the people of Gaza? If not, you are undeserving of common human consideration. You will be given no deference…no common human deference.

There have always been a few, individual, unaffiliated “anti-social” people among us. Because of their lack of deference, conflict often ensues where they go.

What is the effect of large numbers of organized, unified people, moving among strangers, extending no deference?

(I think it’s notable that they wear informal but quite apparent uniforms. It’s also notable that many cover their faces so as to frustrate identification and responsibility.)

[WuzYoungOnceToo]

As a general rule, people are much more civil and kinder when they are interacting in person. Because you see each other as complete people, not just as some embodiment of “the other.”

Also because there's the non-zero probability that you could find yourself on the ground picking up your own teeth...or worse...if the conversation devolves too far.

[Brett Bellmore]

I suspect there's some basic psychological mechanism that causes people to behave around other people, that text just doesn't activate.

[Stella Link the dog]

I think most people find personal confrontation to be unpleasant. Except when in mobs or when alcohol is involved or when trained. It might be cultural or there might be some evolutionary reason, who knows.

[Martinned2]

Indeed. It can even make people agree with things they know to be untrue, like this experiment that Stanley Milgram was working on as a graduate student, before he invented the obedience experiment:

https://socialsci.libretexts.org/Bookshelves/Sociology/Introduction_to_Sociology/Sociology_(Boundless)/06%3A_Social_Groups_and_Organization/6.05%3A_Group_Dynamics/6.5C%3A_The_Asch_Experiment-_The_Power_of_Peer_Pressure#:~:text=Key%20Points,actually%20working%20for%20the%20experimenter.

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

Is it difficult to understand that educated, decent, skilled people would have a few reservations about subsidizing bigoted, superstitious, half-educated, economically inadequate losers?

The important point is that they do help those hayseeds.

[David Nieporent]

Have you even considered what has happened to you, in your life, that you have come to the point of wishing death on so many fellow Americans for having the temerity of disagreeing with you?

But it's also a completely dumbass idea of his! Power lines are not buried a few inches underground such that signs or tent stakes are going to hit them. Quick googling shows that the minimum depth is 18 inches, and that's mostly for lower voltage lines; most power lines are 2-4 feet deep!

[Estragon]

I’ve asked him about this before, haven’t really gotten a response. The serial fabulism, the repeated daily posting of death/murder fantasies… it’s more compulsive than considered, IMO

[Estragon]

I hope he gets help before he hurts himself or someone else

[Dr. Ed 2]

What happens if an American student accepts the Iranian offer of going to an Iranian university? https://www.the-express.com/news/us-news/136135/iran-university-scholarship-students-expelled-gaza-war-protests

Of course what is not being mentioned here is that most of those facing expulsion are not Americans to begin with -- they are here on tourist visas which is why MIT backed off last fall and why the other places are now -- they don't want the little darlings to lose their visas.

[Frank Drackman]

Iranian Anesthesia Resident I knew kept getting threatening letters from the Iranian equivalent of our old Selective Service Boards that he hadn't completed his required military training, he wasn't planning on going back, but wanted to keep his options open (and not have to look over his shoulder forever worrying about some Al-Jizzeera sticking a Ricin needle in him) took some personal time, completed the training, came back in shape, tanned (well he was Iranian, he was already tan) and was named the top recruit in his class, which tells you what a joke the Ear-Ronian Army is (they do have great Uniforms though)

Frank

[David Nieporent]

It's not mentioned because you 100% made it up, not to mention that student visas are different than tourist visas.

[Ed Grinberg]

https://news.gab.com/2024/04/balkanization-the-inevitable-path-forward-for-america/

Wow!
The post starts out as a standard-issue "alt-right" screed against immigration. But, in the fifth paragraph, it suddenly veers off into open antisemitism:

The reality of our current situation is that our elected representatives do not truly represent the people; instead, they serve the interests of the ruling and donor class – the Zionists. This fact has become increasingly apparent in recent weeks, particularly with the passage of the TikTok ban bill and the allocation of billions of taxpayer dollars to Israel. Republicans and Democrats in Congress can’t agree on anything or get anything done, but when it comes to sending our money to Israel and banning TikTok in order to stop young Americans from criticizing Israel online without censorship, they act immediately.

Hmmm... I was not aware that Congress banned TikTok "in order to stop young Americans from criticizing Israel." I very much doubt any member of Congress said so. Based on the author's track record, I am disinclined to credit his claim.
But wait, it gets stranger! After spending the first four paragraphs decrying the fact that "[t]he United States of America is undergoing a radical demographic shift, with tens of millions of people from various cultures and beliefs being imported into the country," the author denounces "the mass hysteria and immediate crackdown response to anti-genocide protests of Israel on college campuses." According to him, "[t]he response to the current protests on college campuses has been characterized by hard crackdowns, the use of force, and nonstop media coverage demonizing the protesters."
To begin with, he's lying. These protests have been going on for months with no interference from college authorities. There was a congressional hearing last December, with (Republican) congressmen asking Ivy League college presidents to explain why, after suppressing "politically incorrect" student / faculty expression for years, they suddenly decided to take a hands-off approach. Even now, there have been precious few instances of "hard [or even not-so-hard] crackdowns." (And if we broaden our scope to include protests outside the campuses, law enforcement response to illegal traffic-blocking protests has been amazingly lax.)
Same goes for "mainstream" media coverage. Contrary to the author's claims, it has not been universally negative. We are repeatedly told that these are "peaceful" protests (even when they are breaking traffic laws / college rules, calling for a genocide of Israelis (in some cases, all Jews!), harassing (and, in some cases, assaulting) Jewish students / passersby).
But, aside from all this, the author can't seem to make up his mind. On the one hand, he has a problem with all these foreigners "from various cultures and beliefs being imported into the country." But in the next breath he defends the "anti-Zionist" protests ... which are (mostly) composed of unassimilable foreigners whose native cultures / beliefs are incompatible with ours. The author's antisemitism is so strong, it makes him forget his main thesis! (Unless, of course, antisemitism is his main thesis.)

[Brett Bellmore]

He actually had me following along until "the Zionists". Nothing prior to that was particularly unreasonable. Actually, once he got past that, his prescription wasn't unreasonable, either.

[Mr. Bumble]

Are the disturbances on American college campi something that should merit an FBI investigation?

[The Margrave of Azilia]

Not the use of new legal theories, but the enforcement of existing laws and rules, is what will deal with this situation.

[Sarcastr0]

I thought you hated the FBI.

[Mr. Bumble]

...but you love them, so answer the question.

[Sarcastr0]

I don't love the FBI, I'm just not so deluded that I think they're a 24-7-lie about Trump because they hate him outfit.

[Mr. Bumble]

Still haven't answered the question.

[Sarcastr0]

I won’t be too put out if they do.

Not sure if it's the right way to spend resources, though. What’s the federal nexus?

Or is this just you trying to make this like January 06, because you’re so partisan it makes you choose to be dumb over and over?

[Mr. Bumble]

"Not sure if it’s the right way to spend resources, though. What’s the federal nexus?"
Foreign money and influence from terrorist groups?

[Sarcastr0]

Your Internet speculation does not create a sufficient predicate.

There's plenty of reporting on that issue, albeit from propagandists more than reporters. Maybe something will turn up that gets federal criminal attention. Not seeing it yet though.

But maybe my take is wrong - FBI policy is not something I know much about. If they get a notion, so be it.

[Stella Link the dog]

Normally, anything emanating from the BumbleBerry is just fatuous crap, but is the idea that "foreign money and influence from terrorist groups" might be of concern clearly nonsensical? News reports indicate that the majority of those arrested at Columbia are not students of Columbia. Does one need to be a conspiracy crank crackpot to wonder who those people are?

[Sarcastr0]

Protesters not being student does not mean they are foreign agents, or getting terrorist money.

[Brett Bellmore]

SJP’s organizational structure seems designed to obscure actual funding sources; They’re NOT organized as a non-profit, to avoid reporting requirements, for instance, and they get their funds through other organizations that are similarly arranged.

Sarcastr0, protesters on campus not being students certainly kills the idea that the protests are local and spontaneous, though.

[Stella Link the dog]

"protesters on campus not being students certainly kills the idea that the protests are local and spontaneous, though."

Suspicion, even if reasonable, is not proof.

[David Nieporent]

Sarcastr0, protesters on campus not being students certainly kills the idea that the protests are local and spontaneous, though.

No, it doesn't. Do you not think there might be a few non-students in the vicinity of Columbia University?

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

A few hundred thousand, or a few million?

[Nige]

ANSWER THE HYPOTHETICAL MADE-UP BAD FAITH
NONSENSE QUESTION SARCASTRO!

Like, only the irretrievably brain-wormed right-wing bubble dwellers would doubt for a second the FBI's willingness to investigate, infiltrate and manipulate lefty student protest movements.

[Mr. Bumble]

In current voting, douche of the day goes to Nige.

[Nige]

I can only aspire to the basic doucheness you guys acheive every ten minutes or so.

[Stella Link the dog]

"In current voting . . ."
Only if you're counting the votes.

[Brett Bellmore]

24/7? Nah. 8/5? Sure, already on record, with the FISA applications.

[Zarniwoop]

hey, Sea Lion! Ask an open-ended Q, with none of your views, then demand other people answer in more pithy yet content-free one-liners!

https://www.merriam-webster.com/wordplay/sealioning-internet-trolling

[Moderation4ever]

No.

[ThePublius]

Yes, I think the FBI should investigate. There is a lot of evidence that these "protests" are instigated, encouraged, funded, and amplified by outside forces. These are not "student protests." They seem to me to be a mission to disrupt American society and life. Take, for example, the "professional" protesters, well beyond college age. The masked, dressed in black people who broke into Hamilton Hall and took it over. The uniformity of the tents at the encampments.

Who's behind this? Who's funding it? Who's organizing it?

The FBI should be looking into this, for sure.

[Sarcastr0]

Is it SOROS?

Silly question - all organized leftish acts lead back to SOROS.

[Mr. Bumble]

Projecting much? Who mentioned Soros?

[Sarcastr0]

Oh, I just had a feeling...

[Nige]

You haven't heard of the 'Soros tents' conspiracy theory?

[ThePublius]

A lot of people believe that and are reporting that. I didn't mention it, though. I think the FBI should look into it.

That said, I have just about zero confidence in the FBI.

[Sarcastr0]

"I think the FBI should look into it.

That said, I have just about zero confidence in the FBI."

You contradict yourself within 1 sentence.
Go outside and touch grass.

[TwelveInchPianist]

How's that a contradiction? Lots of people have zero confidence in the police, but still think they should investigate murders.

Maybe you should touch grass yourself.

[Nige]

You guys are rarely this forgiving when, say, BLM supporters point out how shittily the police do their actual jobs.

[TwelveInchPianist]

I don't know who "you guys" are, but largely agree with BLM supporters about how shiftily the police do their jobs. I, for example, have zero confidence in the police. But I still think they should investigate crime. Is that a contradiction?

[Nige]

NO! THEIR JOB IS TO INVESTIGATE CRIME NOT SHOOT UNARMED BLACK PEOPLE OR UNARMED ANYBODY! WELCOME TO BLM!

Seriously though, nice to actually agree.

[Mr. Bumble]

Seems like quite a few of the police have been shot and killed by armed black people lately

[Nige]

Not an excuse for shooting the unarmed ones.

[NOVA Lawyer]

I don't think "zero confidence" means what you think it means.

But a low level of confidence and even a zero level of confidence in some aspects of the police and the way they perform is warranted. However, we all must have at least some confidence that the police will solve some crimes and bring some criminals to justice or why on earth would we want them to investigate crime at all?

[NOVA Lawyer]

Lots of people have zero confidence in the police, but still think they should investigate murders.

Nope. Many people have low confidence in the police and/or think various negative things about them, but if they want them to investigate murders, by definition they have some confidence that they'll solve one or two.

But to your larger point, he said "just about zero confidence." Yes, not inherently contradictory, though "just about" so.

[Sarcastr0]

Yes, we all know what happened here; it's a collision of shallow conservative desires.

ThePublius wants the government to act as a hammer via the FBI against the bad people.

But he also wants to burnish his conservative 'FBI is bad people' bona fides.

These two requirements are self contradictory to any who engage on a level above bare signifying.

ThePublius was just that shallow.

Those defending him are trying to *defend* being that shallow. Which is worse.

[David Nieporent]

The whole "funded" thing is nuts to begin with. Why do people think it requires "funding" for a few hundred people to camp out? There are like 8 million people who are no more than a subway or bus fare away from Columbia's campus. And it's not like they've got gold plated toilets in their encampments.

[ThePublius]

So, they don't have to go to work to support themselves? How do they have so much free time? And why are the tents and other supplies they have so uniform? It seems someone is making a bulk purchase of these things, and providing support for the protesters, many of whom traveled much farther than the five boroughs to get there, and and far beyond students' typical age.

[Sarcastr0]

Were you never a college kid?

[Nige]

"Outside agitators" is so 1950s Mississippi

[zztop8970]

Or 2024 Manhattan.
https://abcnews.go.com/US/nyc-officials-allege-agitators-opting-columbia-university-protest/story?id=109821934

[Nige]

What's old is new again.

[zztop8970]

Yup. Agents provocateurs are nothing new, they only have new useful idiots as an audience.

[Nige]

Universities value leadership skills. Sounds like they put them to work.

[Kazinski]

Everything needs funds, tents, sleeping bags, toiletrie, food, water. And while its certainly possible the "students" themselves are supplying those things, its a lot easier to get people to show up if they are told "just come we'll take care of everything else, including bail."

Unions pay picketers, why is it difficult to believe it couldn't happen for campus demonstrations?

[Nige]

'why is it difficult to believe'

I see your problem. It's not a question of belief. Or rather, it's solely a question of belief for some people.

[Nige]

'There is a lot of evidence that these “protests” are instigated, encouraged, funded, and amplified by outside forces.'

That 'plagiarism' billionaire guy funded counter-protests. Better do him first.

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

I am not sure this point has occurred to me before: Are you the Publius?

[Martinned2]

Just so you know, I feel your pain. I just voted in the London local elections, and it's all wildly depressing.

- The Tories changed the election system back to first-past-the-post. (We used to always have the option of submitting a first and second choice.) So most races are even less competitive than they were in the past.
- The mayor is wildly unimpressive, albeit in a job where he has very little control over many policy areas that matter to Londoners.
- The Tory candidate is out, not only because I can never forgive the Tories for Brexit, but also because her main campaign issue in recent weeks has been that she will stop the mayor from adopting a policy that he has repeatedly expressly denied having any interest in adopting. (He said so both recently and last year.) That's just a crazy level of mendacity.
- In my assembly constituency the Labour candidate got 57% of the vote last time, so I might as well vote for the LibDem. (Although they are way too far left for my taste.)
- So the only vote I gave that actually mattered was for the London-wide list, where I also went with the LibDems, because nothing good will come of having an absolute Labour majority in the Assembly, particularly if the mayor is also Labour.

So depressing all around.

[Mr. Bumble]

Poor you. Should have stayed in the Netherlands.

[Martinned2]

I can vote in the Netherlands too, but that's not that great either. (Although in the Netherlands I can at least vote for a party that I actually like.)

[Mr. Bumble]

Curious as to how that works. Do you have dual citizenship? Are dual citizens usually allowed to vote in either or both countries?

[Martinned2]

As an EU citizen with settled status I'm allowed to vote in local elections in the UK. Just not the elections for the House of Commons.

[Mr. Bumble]

Thanks.

[Martinned2]

And generally dual citizens are allowed to vote and stand for elections without restrictions in most countries in the world, as far as I know. (But they might face restrictions in the same way single-citizenship people do, for example because they live abroad.)

[Sarcastr0]

I've taken to listening to a British politics podcast (The Rest is Politics) and it sure makes me really like Biden, because wow there are no inspirational or even charismatic politicians in Britain right now in any party.
Ireland and Scotland have good seeming folks on the rise, IIRC.

[Stephen Lathrop]

Sarcastr0, turning to the U.S., have you taken note of Texan Colin Allred? I have hopes that he commands political power sufficient to turn his race against Ted Cruz into suspenseful political entertainment. Any thoughts from Texans on that question?

[Sarcastr0]

I ain’t gonna get my heart broke by a Ted Cruz challenger.

Cruz has come to embody the ‘everyone including his constituents find him loathsome and yet reelection is inevitable’ trope.

Always happy to be disappointed, but I'm not getting attached.

[santamonica811]

Ted Cruz is disliked by liberals, and hated by many liberals. But he is absolute loathed by his fellow Republicans. The Dem equivalent is someone like Anthony Weiner, who was disliked by R's, and loathed and hated by his fellow Dems.

I'm barely on the periphery of Republican political circles. But what R's say about Cruz would curl your hair. ("Whore" and "repugnant" are two of the kindest descriptions. I've literally never heard anyone say anything nice about his personality. People have similar contempt for Lindsay Graham. But Cruz is extremely intelligent, so he can't fall back on the "I'm too stupid to know I'm doing wrong" excuse that everyone applies to Sen. Graham. Lindsay might also be a whore. But at least he's a fairly amiable whore, and is generally liked. [Or, at least, is not hated within his own party.] )

But, as your allude to; in Texas, Cruz's political positions on issues put him squarely in the mainstream of this state (other than re abortion), so people are perfectly willing to hold their noses and vote for him time-after-time. I'd love for a moderate Republican to beat him in a primary. But . . . in Texas? 'Ain't gonna happen.

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

A senator told me that if Sen. Cruz were shot and killed on the Senate floor not one person would testify against the shooter. He told me the result would not differ were the setting a Republican caucus meeting.

One other senator was placed in that category.

[WuzYoungOnceToo]

Allred is Francis "Beto" O'Rourke Part Deux, but with more race-baiting and a lower IQ. And this time around Cruz isn't handicapped by the resentment many R voters were feeling towards him in 2018 because of his being at odds with Trump. The latest poll I saw has Cruz up by 13 points vs Allred.

[Stella Link the dog]

" Cruz isn’t handicapped"

Nor does our Canadian senator seem handicapped by his proclivity to winter in Cancun. Can't stand the cold of a Texas winter. You'd think he'd be used to the cold, being a Canadian and all.

[Brett Bellmore]

I suspect anybody who has endured a Texas winter is going to be pretty understanding about avoiding one.

[Stella Link the dog]

Texas winters: I've lived through about 45 of them (probably more than Ted) and have never felt the need to run away to Mexico in order to avoid one. But then, my earlier days were in Wisconsin and Michigan and New York, unlike our Canadian friend Rafael who calls himself Ted and doesn't speak Spanish.

[Mr. Bumble]

Ever experienced a Blue Norther?

[Stella Link the dog]

Not since I moved to Texas.

I did attend the Ice Bowl in 1967.

[Brett Bellmore]

I doubt they've got anything on a Lake Superior blizzard. I'm still pissed off about walking 5 miles to campus in the middle of one, just to find out that they'd closed the University for the second time in history.

[Mr. Bumble]

I learned the term when stationed at Ft. Hood. Didn't know it was used outside of Texas.
Playing touch football on New Year's Day in T shirt and shorts. Next night had guard duty wearing double layers of everything and have never been so cold in my life.

[Stella Link the dog]

"I learned the term when stationed at Ft. Hood"

Spent my first 11 years as a Texan in west Texas -- Levelland, Midland, Lubbock -- and saw some weather. Little bitty tornadoes called "dust devils" that would get severe enough to overturn a dumpster. In the spring, wind from the west would cause sand to drift across the highway and Lubbock would send out the snow plows to clear it. Don't recall ever hearing the term blue norther and don't recall having experienced that phenomenon, but may have and just considered it another west Texas day.

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

Texas winter?

I worked at one of the largest newspapers in Texas for a year. When a dusting of snow occurred (less than a half-inch), the reporters and photographers went outside to see it. So many traffic accidents occurred that I was asked by the authorities to place an announcement in the afternoon edition directing people involved in collisions to refrain from calling the overwhelmed authorities (citizens were advised to clear traffic lanes, collect identifying and insurance information, prepare sketches, and wait a day or two to call the police). The volume of vehicles along the sides of roads as I drove home that evening was remarkable.

Part of this might have been precipitated by 18-year-old pickup trucks sporting bald tires, but I sensed most drivers were unfamiliar with snowy roads.

[Martinned2]

Yes, The Rest is Politics is great. I listen to every episode.

Charisma is overrated. Boris Johnson had charisma, but that hardly made him a good PM.

[Sarcastr0]

Charisma is multifaceted.

Sometimes it's basically empty and a useless show horse gets elected. Part of the danger of populism.

But a well used bully pulpit can move public sentiment mountains.

Charisma was an important tool for Teddy Roosevelt, FDR, Reagan, Clinton. All of which presided over inflection points in American culture, I'd argue. I don't think that's just a correlation.

Obama was cool and all, and I actually really like Biden's policy moves. But I feel like we're due for an inflection.

[Nige]

I think the UK, Scotland and Ireland are begging, just begging for competent politicians who aren’t scared of straying over some imaginary median line that would get them branded as ‘woke,’ greenies’ or ‘socialists,’ as if that was more important than sorting out various masses. Poor old Northern Ireland is actually the worst off of them all. Competence as charisma, if only people could learn to recognise it.

[Kazinski]

I am not normally very empathetic but honestly I can't feel anything but sad for a person that finds Joe Biden inspirational.

[Estragon]

What about people who find Ted kaczynski inspirational?

[Krayt]

First World problems.

[Martinned2]

That is true. We could do much worse than the people who are currently running London. (Like the guy who is currently running my borough.)

[SRG2]

When the LibDems were a genuinely centrist party in the 90s, I was an active member of the local party in Kensington/Chelsea. Trying to get local candidates elected was a romantic effort...

But I did allow myself to be a candidate in one ward because there was no chance of my being elected.

[Martinned2]

I am basically in the middle of where ALDE/Renew is at the EU-level, which puts me somewhere in between the two main Dutch liberal parties. I used to be a member of the VVD, but quit because I was fed up with their anti-immigrant rhetoric. I'm now a member of the other one, D66, but they're far too woke and lefty for my taste on many issues. My problem with the LibDems is similar. I wouldn't necessarily trust them to run the country or London on their own, but it's probably healthy if they are in a position to constrain whoever does.

[SRG2]

I wouldn’t necessarily trust them to run the country or London on their own,

My experience with many of the LibDems I knew then supports your position.

[Mr. Bumble]

My how Europe has changed:
"Israel’s representative in the Eurovision Song Contest has been told not to leave her hotel room other than for performances because of an expected wave of pro-Palestinian protests.

Eden Golan, 20, arrived in Malmo on Tuesday afternoon amid intense security precautions to begin rehearsing for her performance of the ballad Hurricane.

Swedish police have asked for reinforcements from Denmark and Norway and will be more heavily armed than usual for the world’s biggest pop competition, which, according to the Swedish newspaper Sydsvenskan, is overshadowed by “Jew hatred, riots and terror”.

Read the rest here:
https://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2024/05/a-sign-of-the-times-3.php

[Jonathan Affleck]

Eden Golan is not a Jew. She is a depraved and evil post-Judaism Zionist, who should be arrested, tried, and convicted for genocide participation and genocide incitement.

Like every other Zionist Golan deserves hatred, scorn, and loathing from the entire human race.

[Mr. Bumble]

So says the misanthrope.

[Frank Drackman]

Shes also hot as fuck, and I love how her name is one of the "Occupied Territories"

[Jerry B.]

Dunno. She looks kinda like a cleaned up Greta Thunberg.

[Bwaaah]

But you're not saying you won't go out on a date with her.

[Noscitur a sociis]

Take it to Sweden, Martillo. Sounds like you’ll find plenty of company.

[ReaderY]

As long as the niggers stay on the plantation and say “Yes master” nicely when beaten and don’t do uppity things like ask for wages or try to vote, everything’s jake. It’s those uppity niggers who think they are entitled to rights and autonomy and land who are the evil, genocidal ones that have ro be eliminated. Their evil ideology has to be wiped out. They aren’t even real niggers. They’re depraved, evil, murderous post-nigger Marxists.

Sorry, scratch that. Not niggers, Jews. Not Marxists, Zionists. Gotta keep the vocab and the hate focus current with the times.

[Bwaaah]

That's beautiful. I've tried to say that, but failed pretty miserably. I always seemed to choose the wrong niggers. People are very particular about who can and can't be, and when, and why. I kept finding myself in a doghouse for people who use a Bad Word.

Some people just can't seem to see a world of people without having to see a bunch of niggers in it, messing things up for everybody else. But once they identify the niggers, they tend to get focused on some serious solutions.

Hate. Hateful. Hatefulness.

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

I think this one is Eugene Volokh’s sock puppet.

[Martinned2]

Malmö is quite a poor choice of host city in that regard. It's a place that's well known for Muslim riots. The city is 12% Muslim, which is a lot by Swedish standards.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-66706937

[Dr. Ed 2]

This is why nuking Gaza last October was the right solution.

[Noscitur a sociis]

Why exactly would nuking Gaza have reduced antisemitism in Sweden?

[VinniUSMC]

No one is nuking Gaza. No one (with the power to) is thinking about nuking Gaza. Everyone (with the power to) knows that nuking Gaza is a terrible idea for lots of reasons.

[Frank Drackman]

Like Frazier said about Ali before the Thrilla in Manila, "Kill the Body and the Head will fall" OK, may have it backwards, but throw a few Nukes Terror-Ann's way and watch see how many Rockets Ham-Ass shoots.

[Armchair]

Hypothetically speaking, let's say Biden and people in his administration knew there could be potential criminal charges that could be made against Trump.

But rather than simply pursue them as normal, they cooperated and collaborated to ensure the charges and trials would occur during election season, in order try to affect the 2024 Presidential election.

What laws might they be guilty of violating, in such a scheme to specifically alter the timing of criminal trials, in order to affect the election?

[DaveM]

None. Running the clock ain't a crime. Republicans have the same challenge as Democrats: you have to actually win your election the old fashioned way. And, you have to win it by a large enough margin to earn the right to say you have a mandate.

[not guilty]

“What laws might they be guilty of violating, in such a scheme to specifically alter the timing of criminal trials, in order to affect the election?”

No such laws come to mind. A criminal defendant has no right to be arrested or charged at any particular time between the commission of the offense and the expiration of the applicable limitation period. As SCOTUS opined in United States v. Lovasco, 431 U.S. 783, 790-791 (1977):

It requires no extended argument to establish that prosecutors do not deviate from “fundamental conceptions of justice” when they defer seeking indictments until they have probable cause to believe an accused is guilty; indeed it is unprofessional conduct for a prosecutor to recommend an indictment on less than probable cause. It should be equally obvious that prosecutors are under no duty to file charges as soon as probable cause exists, but before they are satisfied they will be able to establish the suspect’s guilt beyond a reasonable doubt. To impose such a duty “would have a deleterious effect both upon the rights of the accused and upon the ability of society to protect itself,” United States v. Ewell, [383 U.S. 116, 120 (1966).] From the perspective of potential defendants, requiring prosecutions to commence when probable cause is established is undesirable because it would increase the likelihood of unwarranted charges being filed, and would add to the time during which defendants stand accused but untried. [Footnotes omitted.]

What prompted your hypothetical question, Armchair? Did you surmise that such laws as you inquire about do exist?

[Michael P]

Your summary of that opinion does not match what the opinion says. The opinion is silent as to the period between when the prosecutor is “satisfied they will be able to establish the suspect’s guilt beyond a reasonable doubt” and the expiration of the statute of limitations.

[not guilty]

Try Hoffa v. United States, 385 U.S. 293, 310 (1966):

There is no constitutional right to be arrested. The police are not required to guess, at their peril, the precise moment at which they have probable cause to arrest a suspect, risking a violation of the Fourth Amendment if they act too soon, and a violation of the Sixth Amendment if they wait too long. Law enforcement officers are under no constitutional duty to call a halt to a criminal investigation the moment they have the minimum evidence to establish probable cause, a quantum of evidence which may fall far short of the amount necessary to support a criminal conviction. [Footnote omitted.]

[loki13]

Sorry, just dropping in.

Are people trying to argue that there is a constitutional right to be arrested quickly prior to the expiration of the statute of limitations?

I mean ... I've seen stranger things being trotted out recently (business records are not business records, for example), but we are getting into some strange territory.

[Michael P]

No, not guilty is trying to argue that these cases on other topics mean that prosecutors have an unassailable privilege to delay a trial until an election year as long as that’s before the statute of limitations runs.

[Sarcastr0]

While that particular fact pattern is I think novel, not guilty is making the case that there’s a pretty strong precedential foundation for generally broad discretion on that front.

Of course, your hypo is as usual overdetermined, and courts don’t much like obvious pretext, so it’s not 100% clear.
The responses are largely glossing over the legally boring ‘lets assume corrupt actions and motives’ part of your scenario.

[Michael P]

The common thread in what ng cited is "no right to X as soon as the threshold for X is reached", not "it's okay to delay in order to affect an election".

A defendant would still need to convince the court that the trial was delayed for some improper reason, yes, but that's easier when so many of these cases also involve rather novel theories of criminality.

[Sarcastr0]

'Improper' is overdetermined, as is 'novel theories of criminality.' As is your scope of the question as being specifically about elections.

You beg the question that hard, you will sure seem correct. To everyone who already agrees with you.

We're all very proud of your masturbation.

[loki13]

"Improper." Okay, that's an interesting phrase. Improper can mean a lot of things. I think that presidents and presidential candidates should comport themselves with a modicum of dignity, and not doing so is "improper," but that and ... what, fifteen dollars now ... will get you a Big Mac meal at Mickey Dees.

Once you are indicted, you have rights to a speedy trial, and other rights. But you don't have any particular right that I know of to be arrested at a particular time (well, there are issues regarding when warrants can be served, etc.) other than the statute of limitations for crimes.

If this is incorrect, why don't you actually provide some cases, or statutes, or something? You keep saying NG is wrong, but he's actually providing authority. You aren't.

On a legal blog (kinda?), I know that NG is making legal arguments, and you are ... not.

[not guilty]

Michael P, have you actually read the decisions I have cited, or are you merely talking out your ass?

There is dictum in United States v. Marion, 404 U.S. 307, 324 (1971), to the effect that the Due Process Clause of the Fifth Amendment would require dismissal of the indictment if it were shown at trial that the pre-indictment delay in a particular case caused substantial prejudice to the accused's rights to a fair trial and that the delay was an intentional device to gain tactical advantage over the accused. Actual prejudice to the conduct of the defense or a showing that the Government intentionally delayed to gain some tactical advantage over the accused must be alleged and proven. Id., at 325. Speculation prior to trial is insufficient. Id., at 326.

[loki13]

NG,

Agreed that the due process clause might, in some very particular and peculiar circumstances, apply. But that would be from a showing that the timing and delay of the indictment was specifically to disadvantage the rights of the defendant to a fair trial, and that it was a substantial delay to gain a tactical advantage (with regard to the trial).

The issues with that are:

1. I'm not aware of any cases that have followed that dictum. Are you?

2. That dictum came at the absolute height of the pro-defendant jurisprudence.

3. The circumstances would have to be something that affected the trial rights; for example, I could imagine it if a prosecutor knew that an alibi witness was going to die in a few years from cancer, and deliberately waited to file the murder charge until after the death of that witness (since there is no SOL on murder) without accumulating further evidence. But it would have to be a pretty bizarre fact pattern.

[not guilty]

I haven't researched intentional delay to gain tactical advantage, so I don't know whether other cases have followed the dictum in Marion. I once represented a defendant who was indicted for second degree murder, tampering with evidence and abuse of a corpse eight years after the disappearance of the alleged victim, but I decided for tactical reasons not to raise that issue -- my client most likely benefited from the delay.

[loki13]

Yeah, I was thinking that generally, delays in time benefit the defendant. Easier to raise reasonable doubt.

Anyway, just wanted you to know that some of us appreciate that you inject actual law-like substance into the conversations.

[Brett Bellmore]

"delays in time benefit the defendant."

I'm sure they absolutely favor the guilty defendant, but I'm not so sure they favor the innocent defendant.

The guilty defendant probably benefits from evidence expiring, witnesses memories fading, and so forth.

But if you're innocent to begin with, doesn't that work against you?

[Brett Bellmore]

Sadly, while it's unethical, they actually do.

[kramartini]

I think you mean the strange notion that "not business records are business records".

[Brett Bellmore]

Not all scummy actions have laws against them.

[Jason Cavanaugh]

In this remarkably butthurt hypothetical, do the delay tactics by Trump himself have anything to do with the laws you desperately hope exist?

Cry more lol.

[Nige]

The phrase 'butthurt hypothetical' has arrived, and not before time, it's been sorely needed. For all the hurt butts.

[TwelveInchPianist]

"But rather than simply pursue them as normal, they cooperated and collaborated to ensure the charges and trials would occur during election season, in order try to affect the 2024 Presidential election."

If you could show that the prosecution was timed in order to prevent the defendant from exercising a constitutional right (like running for president) then selective prosecution might apply, but that's far from clear and I have no reason to think Trump would be able to show that.

[not guilty]

"If you could show that the prosecution was timed in order to prevent the defendant from exercising a constitutional right (like running for president) then selective prosecution might apply, but that’s far from clear and I have no reason to think Trump would be able to show that."

No, that is not what selective prosecution -- an equal protection violation -- is about.

[Alpheus W Drinkwater]

Is running for President a constitutional right?

[not guilty]

There is no fundamental constitutional right to run for president. Lindsay v. Bowen, 750 F.3d 1061, 1063-1064 (9th Cir. 2014) (upholding refusal to place name of 27 year old on California's presidential ballot).

[Krayt]

Good question. Violation of laws? I dunno. Spirit of everybody is equal before the law, sure.

Making sure you start, and ideally, finish the trial before the election for the express purpose of hampering the opponent is not equality before the law.

One clever professor, at least, recognized this as a problem and conjured up the idea The People need timely prosecution (independent of elections) to feel assured in the competency of the law in going after lawbreakers. Dishonest, but playing the game.

[jb]

To tangent a little, since everyone seems convinced the various cases against Trump were slow-walked in order to have trials during an election year, let's look at some comparable cases!

- John Edwards was indicted in June 2011 for conduct alleged in 2007-2008, so 3-4 years later
- Larry Householder indicted in July 2020 for conduct beginning in February 2017, so 3-ish years later, although maybe you'd argue that it was mostly in the 2018 election cycle so best-case 2 years later. On the other hand, just last month there was a state indictment, so 6-7 years later.
- Robert Menendez was indicted in September 2023 for conduct beginning in 2018 (and over a year after they raided his house in 2022), so ~5 yeas later
- The best example of a fast indictment of a politican I can see was Rod Blagojevich, who was arrested and indicted within a few months of trying to sell off Obama's Senate seat, but mostly because he was caught in the midst of an ongoing four-year corruption investigation.

For those arguing or implying that the Trump prosecutions were intentionally slowed down to align to the election cycle, do you have examples of similar federal investigations of political figures that went a lot faster?

[David Nieporent]

What laws might they be guilty of violating, in such a scheme to specifically alter the timing of criminal trials, in order to affect the election?

Assuming the charges themselves are legitimate, none. What you describe would be a political offense, not a criminal one, and the remedy would be at the ballot box.

[Armchair]

Interesting...Well, I had some time to look into this.

Let's assume for a second that the Biden White House was actively collaborating and colluding with the various prosecutions in order to arrange it so they all happened during election season. What laws may apply?

1. Obstruction of Justice.
-It sounds a little odd at first glance, but many of the obstruction of justice charges are worded such that anyone who "corruptly persuades" an individual to "delay" proceedings would be guilty of Obstruction of Justice.

How would this work? Well, you'd need evidence from the Biden administration. Something along the lines of "hold off doing this for the prosecution now, so we can hit the election season". That would be a "delay" that the Biden Administration is "persuading" the prosecutor to make for a "corrupt" purpose. Furthermore, if it happened in two or more prosecutions, this would turn into a RICO investigation. I think there's a solid case there, assuming some evidence or testimony pops up.

2. Alternatively, 18 U.S. Code § 245 protects people from being interfered with while campaigning. More of a stretch, but possible especially if corrupt motives were used to do it.

3. A third potential case is campaign finance fraud, due to collusion and in-kind donations. How much is taking your primary opponent off the campaign trail worth? Potentially, but a little weak.

Overall, the Obstruction of Justice charges are strongest. It's a bit odd, but the "delay" into election season may be what does it. I'd suggest a full accounting of records and when items were organized with the Biden White House and what was suggested and when.

[not guilty]

Okay, I’ll bite. Each federal criminal statute is composed of elements, typically defining the actus reus and the mens rea necessary to culpability. Every element of the offense must be proven beyond a reasonable doubt.

Obstruction of justice in violation of which statute(s), Armchair? Suppose you are a federal prosecutor drafting an indictment. What particulars would you allege?

Which actor(s) in the Biden Administration do you posit are subject to prosecution?

As to any alleged RICO offense, what is the enterprise? Who are the principals? How does the enterprise engage in or affect interstate or foreign commerce? What persons have derived income from a pattern of racketeering activity or through collection of an unlawful debt? What predicate felonies evince a pattern of racketeering activity?

As to each violation alleged, how would the exercise of public authority not constitute a defense or exception to criminal liability?

[not guilty]

Still waiting, Armchair.

[Noscitur a sociis]

-It sounds a little odd at first glance, but many of the obstruction of justice charges are worded such that anyone who “corruptly persuades” an individual to “delay” proceedings would be guilty of Obstruction of Justice.

That is not, in fact, how the statute is worded.

[Drewski]

Gee, I can't seem to find any of that in the federal obstruction of justice statute. Are you referring to state law? I think there's a provision like that in the criminal code of North Bullshit.

[SRG2]

If you were right, Trump would have been keen for trials to take place as quickly as possible. Was he? Or has he been trying to delay?

[Kazinski]

Don't do it in NY, it sounds like a scheme to promote or impede the electoral prospects of a candidate in an election.

[DaveM]

Is it just me, or is the staying power of the Latest Outrage getting shorter? Gone are the “glory days” of the lockdowns. These days, a pro-Hamas demonstration only gets you about 2-3 weeks of news coverage, tops.

Maybe people are realizing that these cycles are being manufactured by professional service organizations who specialize in exactly this kind of thing. These outrage cycles do all seem to be coming out of the same playbook.

Or maybe people are just bored with it.

[Malika the Maiz]

Pro-Israeli Counter-Protestors Attack Pro-Palestinian Protestors at UCLA:

The University of California in Los Angeles was reeling on Wednesday following a late-night violent attack by counter-demonstrators on a pro-Palestinian protest encampment, as the state’s governor condemned a slow response from law enforcement

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2024/may/01/violence-erupts-ucla-university-campus-clashes-rival-gaza-protest-groups

[ThePublius]

Yes, and what that report doesn't say, nor do any of the "mainstream media," is that this "attack" was in response to a female Jewish student being beaten unconscious on April 30th by pro-palestinian protesters.

https://www.news9live.com/videos/world-videos/ucla-protests-jewish-student-beaten-unconscious-by-pro-palestine-protesters-video-2519144

[Nige]

Oh, so if a story about a woman being beaten pops up somewhere, the attack becomes an "attack" and three hours of violence and racism is suddenly justified? Nothing could possibly justify the students breaking rules, but this justifies actual violence? While the cops stand by and let it happen?

[ThePublius]

i confess I'm not following, Nige. I didn't say anything was justified, I was just saying that the media are saying that pro-Israelis instigated an attack on pro-palestinians, without telling the whole story.

[Sarcastr0]

You're saying 'he hit me first' is a good excuse.

[TwelveInchPianist]

Not he's not, he's saying it's important context that should be part of the story.

Seems correct to me.

[Brett Bellmore]

Actually, "he hit me first" is often a darned good excuse, though the connection here is too remote to be legally relevant.

[Sarcastr0]

Vigilantism is profoundly immature. It's lack of ability to control your violent impulses, but cowardly enough you let your immaturity fly by proxy.

[Commenter_XY]

Sarcastr0 swoops in to blame the victim. Color me surprised.

[Bob from Ohio]

He wants to shout "From the river to the sea" so badly.

[Sarcastr0]

How shitty if you.

[Stella Link the dog]

Maybe in Brettistan, but not so much in the real world. Self defense -- good. Retaliation -- dangerous fun.

[Brett Bellmore]

Yeah, but self defense actually does often involve hitting somebody who hit you first, which was my point.

Not in this case, as I was quite explicit about.

[Stella Link the dog]

"which was my point."

If that was your point, you should have made it.

Compare and contrast:
“he hit me first”
and
"I was just defending myself."

[Sarcastr0]

You are not describing self defense; punches are not lethal force.

[Kazinski]

Yep, so it was punches on both sides.

I didn't see any reports of lethal force.

[Mr. Bumble]

Punches can certainly be lethal force.

[Sarcastr0]

Saying ‘he hit me first’ is still not a good excuse.

And Brett set the goalposts by citing self defense.

Mr. Bumble, good luck if you ever want to go with that defense at trial. Con Air was not a documentary.

[Nige]

Well, you linked the two explicitly, and there was none of the outraged condemnation reserved for kids breaking rules by putting up tents, and the provenance and relevance of the supposed intitiating event seems doubtful. Even if it turns out to be factual and accurate, they still 'instigated' the attack, and the attack itself was brutal and nasty and went on for three hours.

[TwelveInchPianist]

"Oh, so if a story about a woman being beaten pops up somewhere, the attack becomes an “attack” and three hours of violence and racism is suddenly justified?"

No, but if a story about a response to an attack, justified or not, omits the actual attack, the you are leaving out important context and your motives should be questions.

It's like writing about the LA Riots without mentioning Rodney King or the acquittal.

[Nige]

Assuming there was an attack. You're claiming the media suppressed the story, but there's also another reason why they might not cover it. Or has nobody been reporting at all on scuffles between protesters and counter-protesters?

[Brett Bellmore]

So, the protesters beat unconscious a female Jewish student at UCLA. Jewish counter-protesters find out about it and attack the encampment.

And your take on it is "a woman being beaten pops up somewhere", as though to imply that it might have been someplace else? And that it doesn't provide any useful context?

[Nige]

No more than other scuffles between them. And we've already seen the counter-protesters engage in dirty tricks. In fact the attacks show that they're more prone to violence by far than the protesters.

[Bob from Ohio]

The counter protestors are resisting a settler colonial occupation of the quad. They can resist in anyway necessary.

[Nige]

Sounds more like West Bank settlers coveting patches of land other people are already on. They get nod-and-wink legal sanction too.

[Dr. Ed 2]

Nige, the Hamas Fan Club got what they deserved.
These are not "peaceful protests" -- it's just time the Jews fought back.

Exodus 22.2

[Sarcastr0]

"The Jews."

[Bob from Ohio]

Yes, Jews. We fight back now.

[also per reports some Persian allies]

[Sarcastr0]

One thing you have made very clear through your positions through the years is you certainly do not speak for Jews generally.

[Bob from Ohio]

On this I do.

[Stella Link the dog]

If you don't know many Jews who view Israel's war against Gaza unfavorably, you don't know many Jews.

[Sarcastr0]

Bob "I am Bob from Ohio, and I speak for the Jews!"

Don't make a fool of yourself.

Especially when this is not in any way a departure from your usual childlike bad guys/good guys view of the world.

[Bob from Ohio]

"By comparison, 89% of Jewish Americans say Israel’s reasons for fighting Hamas are valid – far more than the 58% of all U.S. adults who say this. Younger Jews are less likely than their older counterparts to say Israel’s reasons for fighting Hamas are valid, though about eight-in-ten or more in every age group say this. April 2, 2024 "How U.S. Jews are experiencing the Israel-Hamas war" Pew Research

[yes, I know, issue polls are garbage but you guys disagree so sue me]

[Sarcastr0]

You disingenuous liar:
"Jewish adults under 35 are divided over Israel’s military response: 52% say the way Israel has carried out the war has been acceptable, while 42% call it unacceptable"

Also, of course, none of this has jack shit to do with there being a general Jewish desire to get into fights with protesters.

Do not cloak your shitty opinions in that of Jews generally.

[Bob from Ohio]

"52% say the way Israel has carried out the war has been acceptable,"

Still the majority dude.

I can pick my sub-groups too

"Jews ages 50 and older are far more likely to say Israel’s conduct of the war has been acceptable (68%)."

[Sarcastr0]

First, there is no survey question about ‘want to fight protesters.’

Second, you aren’t saying ‘I speak for a majority of the Jews’ you are arrogating to yourself the position of Jews generally. No new goalposts.

Your cocksure broad generalization is stupid if you know anything about Jews. Or anything about you.

[Nige]

Wow, ‘fighting back.’ Putting up tents is such an intolerable crime. Tantamount to violence! The brave tent vigilantes struck a blow! With real violence!

[Bob from Ohio]

They beat up a Jewish woman that afternoon. No need to wait for more violence to act.

[Nige]

‘They’ did, did they? Guess they’re also into collective punishment and propaganda. Maybe the cops were too busy investigating the crime to intervene.

[Bob from Ohio]

The cops were staying away as demanded.

[Nige]

By the vigilantes? Wow. You guys sure do value rules and law'n'order.

[Dr. Ed 2]

It's about time.

[Bob from Ohio]

The funny thing with all the whining in the Guardian piece is one of their demands is no LAPD on campus. Make up your minds!

[Stella Link the dog]

Where in the Guardian piece was that demand (that no LAPD be on campus) made? Are you misrepresenting Teresa Wanatabe's observation that violence was occuring and that there had been no police response?

[Bob from Ohio]

Its not in the Guardian article. I saw it on twitter.

"UCLA community organizes encampment in response to national call for escalation" Daily Bruin By Dylan Winward and Catherine Hamilton
April 25, 2024 11:19 a.m.

"The mobilization’s goals include ... severing UCLA’s ties with LAPD"

[links do not work for me]

[Stella Link the dog]

"Its not in the Guardian article. I saw it on twitter."

Excuse me for thinking that you were claiming to have seen it in the Guardian when that is what you claimed.

"The funny thing with all the whining in the Guardian piece is one of their demands is no LAPD on campus."

The "their" in your sentence clearly refers to the Guardian writers.

Oh, you meant some other "their." You should confront your ESL teacher and ask for your money back.

[Bob from Ohio]

The "their" meant the "protestors".

"you were claiming to have seen it in the Guardian"

I made no such claim, you can't read very well.

[Stella Link the dog]

"The funny thing with all the whining in the Guardian piece is one of their demands is no LAPD on campus. Make up your minds!"

That's your entire post, NumbNuts. To whom does "their" in that sentence refer?

Damn, you are an idiot of the Mr Ed level.

[Bob from Ohio]

The ones doing the whining who are the protestors.

Maybe less stealing from the evicted and learn to read.

[Stella Link the dog]

I should know better than to try to pet a rabid dog.

[Bob from Ohio]

Grrr!

[Malika the Maiz]

"learn to read." Oh, come on. The most natural reading of “The funny thing with all the whining in the Guardian piece is one of their demands is no LAPD on campus” is that “their” refers to the Guardian.

[Bob from Ohio]

No its not. What "demands" is the Guardian making?

[Nige]

Proves every point ever made about the cops. They don't do their actual jobs, they just like hurting people, preferably unarmed, and they play favourites.

[Ed Grinberg]

"...and they play favourites."
Unlike college administrators...

[Nige]

Man you guys love your arbitrary law enforcement and state-sanctioned vigilantism.

[Stephen Lathrop]

My advocacy on behalf of a more-empowered interpretation of the Constitutional right of peaceable assembly has attracted neither widespread assent, nor even occasional support among this blog's commenters. I think that is unwise.

I think it is also indication that this blog's audience is skewed heavily individualist. That makes it hostile to all notions of collective political liberties, however constitutional they may be, or however indispensable to originalist notions of American constitutionalism. Doubly unwise.

[DaveM]

That’s correct, libertarians aren’t going to be getting in line to sign up for collectivist ideals of any type. This should be unsurprising. Generally speaking, libertarians believe that rights are inalienable to persons, and governments exist to protect them. Collectivists believe in nearly the inverse, rights belong to the collective government, and are granted to individual persons as earned/deserved.

[Jonathansingletary]

This is a reductive and poor understanding of collectivism.

[Michael P]

When nobody is buying your nutty ideas, you should examine who the one being unwise is.

[ThePublius]

"...a more-empowered interpretation of the Constitutional right of peaceable assembly..."

Stephen, could you briefly summarize your view?

[Commenter_XY]

lathrop and brevity do not go together.

[Stephen Lathrop]

Commenter_XY, I am sometimes brief, but occasionally long-winded. The latter is a vice, to the extent that better editing could shorten a piece while improving it. But because some clearly do read my longer stuff, and I often lack time to edit, it is what it is. Plenty of the stuff from the conspirators themselves runs longer than anything I have ever published here.

On not commenting at all, I do better than many who comment here regularly. In comparison to those, my total word count may be smaller than you suppose. Mine is certainly smaller than that of frequent-flyer right wingers like Bellmore. Sarcastr0, not a right-winger, is typically brief, but it is near-certain he publishes more words here than I do.

I like brevity in a neglige, admire it as wise policy for a public speaker, and too often experience it as a disappointment when reading Mark Twain—especially in his humorous essays to critique long-winded authors. But Twain even wrote one essay—mentioning Horace Greeley's travels in the West—to demonstrate how to turn long-windedness and repetition into the soul of humor. It took all my faith in Twain's genius to get me through it, but today I discover it has its uses.

[Commenter_XY]

Is that what you call it, long winded? Alright lathrop, I'll go with that. 🙂

Brevity in writing is the best insurance for its perusal.
- Virchow

[Stephen Lathrop]

Virchow was as unfamiliar with me, as I with him. I usually write with only faint hope to prove persuasive. I am more interested to see if I can get my own ideas clear on the page.

[WuzYoungOnceToo]

I think it is also indication that this blog’s audience is skewed heavily individualist. That makes it hostile to all notions of collective political liberties

Wow...you've surmised that the participants on a libertarian site skew toward maximum individual liberty vs collectivist notions of rights? You are one sharp cookie.

[Krayt]

"Collective liberty" literally has only one purpose: others want to have the power to deny you that right.

This is synonymous with dictatorship. Who prays for such a subsevient state?

[Krayt]

I have no problem with peaceful encampments. I do have problems with blocking doors and shutting things down, having been irritated by such in the distant past. This is hardly some new thing.

[Nige]

IRRITATION!

[The Margrave of Azilia]

Professor with expertise in the political system discusses the obvious:

"The Democrats and Republicans are not passive observers of Duverger’s law. The two major parties have largely run minor-party competitors out of business in intentional ways....

"Although a third party is not likely to have much electoral success anytime soon, they do enrich American politics.

"The campaigns of Perot in 1992 and Ralph Nader and Pat Buchanan in 2000 increased overall voter turnout. Injecting new ideas and forcing the major parties to incorporate a wider array of interests remain the most tangible results of minor-party and independent campaigns."

(The references to Nader and Buchanan should bring out the hyperventilating comments.)

https://thecincinnatiherald.com/2024/05/01/independent-candidates-presidential-race/

[Stephen Lathrop]

Margrave, one need not hyperventilate to note that crazy happenstance regarding incompetent ballot design should not generally turn into a pivot upon which the fate of the nation swivels at random.

Also? That was an accident made possible only by failure to correct the mistake of reliance on the Electoral College.

[Brett Bellmore]

Lathrop, when the election turns on a fractional percentage difference between the candidates, you are quite naturally going to get an embarrassment of "but for" causes for the election outcome. And people who whine about that 'butterfly ballot' like to forget that Buchannan's statewide campaign head happened to live right in Palm beach, the sort of factor that can cause local anomalies in candidate support.

Just be happy the recounts were confined to one state. Can you imagine a close election with a national popular vote? Fraud ANYWHERE could be decisive!

Though I would like to see more states allocate EC votes semi-proportionately, with the ones due to your Rep count allocated by the results in each House district, and the Senate ones statewide.

[bernard11]

Can you imagine a close election with a national popular vote? Fraud ANYWHERE could be decisive!

Bad argument, Brett. Terrible. Innumerate. The fact is that under the EC fraud ANYWHERE could be decisive, and could have been in FL in 2000.

Think about the arithmetic. Under the EC fraud that changes the outcome in a single state is hugely amplified by its effect on the EC.

In a popular vote election swinging 1000 votes in a close state is unlikely to change the outcome. With the EC amplification it could decide the election.

Trumpists like to complain that changing only some (fairly small) number of votes in key states would have made Trump the winner in 2020. But that wouldn't do it in a popular vote election.

[Davy C]

The one problem with doing it by House district is that then gerrymandering can affect the Presidential election.

[Brett Bellmore]

It's certainly true.

As I've recounted before, I joined the LP as my first political home in the late 70's. At that time we were well aware that the major parties held quite a bit of power to control the rules, and understood that we would have to grow very fast, so that by the time they realized we posed a threat, it would be too date to effectively outlaw us.

Long story short, we didn't, they did. Basically every change in the last 40+ years to election laws, campaign finance, and the way debates and coverage are handled has been harmful to the prospects of 3rd parties. I don't remotely think that was an accident.

Example: The League of Women voters were handling the Presidential debates, had been for many years, and nobody had any complaints. Until they decided that a 3rd party candidate had qualified to be included according to the existing rules.

Suddenly they were unacceptable, and we got the bipartisan commission on Presidential debates.

Now we're getting these 'jungle primaries', which not at all incidentally basically guarantee that third parties can't make the general election ballot. And more and more states are outlawing write in votes.

We have a much less free election system than back in the 70's, when it looked like a third party might be successful. I think that's part of why the major parties are becoming so awful: They no longer have to be seen as good, just less bad than the other guy, because no other options are realistically available anymore.

[Martinned2]

Now we’re getting these ‘jungle primaries’, which not at all incidentally basically guarantee that third parties can’t make the general election ballot.

No. Instead they create what is effectively a 2-round system, like in Georgia, which is probably the best any third party can hope for.

[Brett Bellmore]

You know, you're not actually contradicting me here, you do realize that, don't you? Sure, you can call the jungle primary the "first round", but it doesn't do anything at all to change the fact that you don't get to the general election ballot.

[Martinned2]

You do if you have enough voters who like you.

[The Margrave of Azilia]

Each party, using its own internal processes without state "assistance," should designate its candidates for the general election ballot.

As for "voters who like you," maybe there should be a system - call it elections - by which we learn which parties and candidates are liked by the voters.

[Martinned2]

In what way does a jungle primary prevent that? What you're complaining about is just what the state chooses to call the two rounds of its two round system. What the parties do before the first round is still entirely up to them.

[The Margrave of Azilia]

The parties can't nominate their own candidates for either of the two elections. As I understand it, anyone can file, including multiple candidates for the same party, without the party getting to decide from among them who gets on the general or other election ballot.

[Martinned2]

So the Republican party can't say to the electorate "Hey, there are 3 guys on the ballot with an R behind their name for some reason, but the one we want you to vote for is Joe Smith."?

[The Margrave of Azilia]

Official party candidates should be described as such on the ballot.

[Martinned2]

@Margrave: I agree. But if, for whatever reason, it has pleased the state not to allow that, the party can still communicate with the electorate directly.

[Sarcastr0]

As I've said before, if you care about results and not parties, a jungle primary in what is basically a single party state is something you should welcome.

[The Margrave of Azilia]

It sounds like it prevents parties from nominating their own candidates through their own procedures - a defect in the whole system of state-run primaries, made even worse when the primaries don't even produce decisive nominees for the parties.

"care about results and not parties"

Then you're for easy access of genuinely independent candidates free of party taint?

[Brett Bellmore]

Historically, though, jungle primaries CREATE single party states, by demoralizing voters in the lesser party.

As I tediously keep pointing out, at the time the 14th amendment was adopted, the right to vote was the right to vote for anyone you damned well pleased, regardless of popularity, party, or even qualifications. The Australian ballot came later, at the time you handed in a piece of paper with the names of whoever you were voting for, and that was it. No "ballot access" was ever contemplated as qualifying the right to vote.

it was only later that states began pre-printing ballots as a convenience, and then realized they could use that as a way to 'curate' the voters' choices. Actually prohibiting write in votes, not just omitting candidates from the ballot, is a VERY new development.

And is a genuine voting rights violation, IMO.

[Martinned2]

You sound like you're complaining about the fact that you can't win without convincing a majority of voters.

[Brett Bellmore]

No, I'm complaining that incumbents can now control who the voters are allowed to vote for. That's a VERY dangerous development in a democracy.

[Sarcastr0]

Your drama about general ballots having restrictions doesn't track.

It could be bad policy, but it is not a crisis of democracy.

[Brett Bellmore]

And it won't be, until Republicans are doing it to Democrats.

[Sarcastr0]

A bare accusation of counterfactual bad faith?

Lame.

[Sarcastr0]

Your first sentence posits a functionalist thesis about the effect of jungle primaries.

The rest of your post establishes (if I take your historical take as truth) that change has occurred since the 1860s.

I'm open to policy arguments to expand ballot access, but this is amazingly weak.

[bernard11]

I honestly don't get the objection to jungle primaries.

A jungle primary looks to me like an open first round with the top two finishers, regardless of party, then competing in the final.

The only way that blocks third parties is if their candidate(s) don't enjoy enough support to make the run-off, in which case they aren't going to win anyway.

Are you saying that if the 3rd party candidate could just jump into the final they would win, even though they don't enough support to get out of the primary?

I'm honestly not getting your objection.

[Brett Bellmore]

The objection is that the "primary" is a mechanism for parties to decide who they will put up for the general election. The only reason states run them at all is that the major parties decided to outsource some of their internal expenses.

You want to have the general election have a runoff if nobody gets a majority? Fine, I like that idea. But everybody needs to be able to get onto the general election ballot, because otherwise the government is able to control who you can vote for, and that's really bad.

[Sarcastr0]

If anything the primary system is more restrictive to electoral choice.

everybody needs to be able to get onto the general election ballot, because otherwise the government is able to control who you can vote for, and that’s really bad.

This has long been left to the states. Laboratories of democracy, eh? There were ballot access rules starting when the first ballots started around the turn of the century.

You want a pretty radical centralization of the system. I'm actually not opposed, but you'll need more arguments than dire warnings of democracy in peril when it's been going on for over a century.

[Brett Bellmore]

"This has long been left to the states."

Which for most of our history let you vote for anybody you wanted. States preventing you from voting for your own choice of candidate is a very new innovation. It wasn't until '92 that the Supreme court ruled that a state could constitutionally prohibit write in votes, and lately the practice has been spreading.

You know, Stalin said that it didn't matter who voted, it mattered who counts the votes. Well, it also doesn't matter who votes, if the state can control who you're allowed to vote for in the first place.

[Sarcastr0]

Ballot restrictions were added by necessity just about when ballots became a thing. I do not know this org but they have what i understand to be the right of it:
"The Australian ballot also affected which candidates could get on the official ballot, which until then, with no official ballot, had been relatively uninhibited."
https://firstamendment.mtsu.edu/article/ballot-access/

Again, I don't think your policy of opening up the ballot is bad (though I will die on the hill of the jungle primary being best for outparties in single party states).
But your drama does you no favors. Ranting about Stalin and the end of democracy isn't going to really get you a lot of takers.

By contrast, the article I linked above: "Restricting ballot access can limit discourse to two political parties" note the lack of drama, while still advocating for your point of view.

[Michael P]

California also uses jungle primaries to greatly reduce the number of Republicans in general elections. And these interact with ballot access laws to require third parties to re-qualify over and over, even if they would regularly get some votes in a larger (single-winner) general election.

[Martinned2]

California also uses jungle primaries to greatly reduce the number of Republicans in general elections.

I can see how that would be the effect in a state where Republicans are a minority. But the more important fact is that jungle primaries allow Republican voters to push the outcome of the electoral process to the right, instead of simply being asked to waste their votes in the primaries and then again in the general election.

[Sarcastr0]

California also uses jungle primaries to greatly reduce the number of Republicans in general elections
Got bad news for you about California before the jungle primary.

I don't know why you're excited about letting the Dem primary select the candidate while the GOP gets to ineffectually put up some loser, versus having two viable candidates and thus some some ideological decision making on the general ballot.

[Bob from Ohio]

"some ideological decision making on the general ballot."

Why aren't republicans grateful that they get to choose between a far left Dem and further left Dem? Its a mystery.

Sometimes its two further left Dems. That is the best choice for republicans!

[Sarcastr0]

The key is that the alternative is they get to choose nothing.

Because the Dem will win and the primary to select the Dem they have no voice in.

[Bob from Ohio]

Choose between rotten fish and rotten eggs. Yeah!

[Sarcastr0]

So you're just going to complain no matter what the system is.

Well fuck off then.

[Bob from Ohio]

"So you’re just going to complain no matter what the system is."

The system 47 other states use is fine.

The jungle primary is both Louisiana and California is intended to cement one party's control.

[Sarcastr0]

You would prefer no choice to some choice.

Because you're an idiot.

California does not need to cement one party's control.

[bernard11]

California also uses jungle primaries to greatly reduce the number of Republicans in general elections.

How do they do that?

[Bob from Ohio]

If the choice for offices are both Dems, why vote at all if you are a GOPer.

[Sarcastr0]

You'll be able to vote for the most conservative viable candidate. Getting a half a loaf is better than none.

Except to the modern GOP who hates compromise and spends all their time yelling about that other guy's bread to trying to get any of their own.

Also, are you arguing that making people less likely to vote is antidemocratic? I'll be sure and tell the voter ID folks!

[Bob from Ohio]

"Getting a half a loaf is better than none. "

In California? Dude, all the Dem politicians in California suck.

[Sarcastr0]

Dude, you’re getting a Dem in Cali regardless.

‘How DARE you give me a voice!’

[Bob from Ohio]

There is no voice, you get 99.9% [or more] of the same views and votes no matter who you vote for.

[Sarcastr0]

Or maybe you don't.

Some choice is better than none.

You are smart enough to realize this, but you pretend otherwise because you're an agro weirdo.

[not guilty]

Well, Arnold Schwarzenegger won a blanket primary in California in 2003 and was re-elected by a healthy margin in 2006.

Do you know the real reason that Maria Shriver married Schwarzenegger?

They hoped to breed a bullet proof Kennedy.

[Krayt]

Perot's goal was to get Bush, Sr., to lose, not to inject new ideas. I liked Perot, but did not realize this until years later.

As recently as 2 weeks before the Democratic convention, SNL was making jokes about how hopeless the Democrats' chances were.

The day Clinton was to give his acceptance speech, Perot withdraws, saying, "The Democrats are reinvigorated." All eyes turn to Bill Clinton.

A few weeks later he gets back in just to make sure.

I don't know why he hated Bush, Sr. so much, but they were both big players with the Republicans in the 1970s, so god knows how they may have butted heads (Bush was head of the CIA.)

[Sarcastr0]

Perot’s goal was to get Bush, Sr., to lose, not to inject new ideas. I liked Perot, but did not realize this until years later.

Tin foil again, Krayt? Come on, man.

[Malika the Maiz]

FIRE Criticizes House Passed Antisemitism Bill:

But the “double standards” example and the notion that Nazi comparisons are off-limits in the case of Israel, among other aspects of the definition, are deeply problematic because they’re too broad and present “viewpoint discrimination,” said Tyler Coward, lead counsel for government affairs at the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression, a First Amendment advocacy organization.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/house-passes-antisemitism-bill-over-complaints-from-first-amendment-advocates/ar-AA1nZVEH

[Stephen Lathrop]

Malika, the lead counsel for government affairs at FIRE would do better to concentrate on the more-important but generally overlooked principle that government ought to have no business interrogating about politics the leaders of private educational institutions.

The dismissed university presidents themselves may well have deserved their fates. There was culpable incompetence in their failure to find a polite way to tell the congressional demagogues to pound sand.

[DaveM]

LOL. And the very best way to tell someone to pound sand is with exquisite politeness. My father, a classic old school Southern gentleman, was a dead eye shot with this rhetorical weapon. Man, could he ever kill 'em with faint praise!

[Krayt]

Making leaders of private organizations, not just universities, come stand tall before congressional committees and answer questions about speech is nothing new. Just ask heads of facebook & friends on why they were dragging ass censoring harrassment. And that was hardly new even then.

[Jonathan Affleck]

So offensive.

Biden uses the Nazi Holocaust of 80 years ago to deflect and to distract from the Gaza Holocaust, in which he criminally conspires today.

https://www.ushmm.org/information/press/president-joseph-biden-to-deliver-keynote-address-at-museums-annual-days-of

I am sorry my father’s family was murdered 80 years ago, but I am more concerned about the mass murder genocide that takes place today in Gaza.

There should be a protest.

The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum is inciting, propagandizing, and assisting mass murder genocide.

[ReaderY]

Of course, what is obvious ordinary self defense if done by anyone else is genocide to Jonathan Affleck only when done by Jews.

If he keeps repeating it often enough, maybe he might even be able to convince himself it’s true.

It’s not like Jews are the first people to have been accused of genocide for having the nerve to defend themselves by people intent on doing to them exactly what they accuse their victims of.

After all, Jonathan addmitted recently he wants all Jews in Israel to be enslaved.

Maybe he can get himself a nice Jewish girl as his sex-slave to fuck in the ass whenever he wants and whip her for genocide if she has the nerve to scream.

It’s not like he can any any other way. Maybe it will work.

[Nige]

I grey-boxed Affleck long ago, but holy shit, if your accusations of anti-semitism (and he is an anti-semite) involve you typing out the most disgusting anti-semitism and atrributing it to someone else, then clearly anti-semitism doesn’t offend you as much as you claim, and seems to have a weird fascination for you, like those homophobes who keep typing out gay pr0n, or even worse, the ‘child protectors’ who type out child pr0n).

To put it another way, if you can’t criticse a person’s anti-semitism using their actual words but have to keep putting words that YOU wrote into their mouths, you need to reconsider your approach. Because if your scroll down through a discussion and the most revolting anti-semitic comments are coming from people who claim to be criticising anti-semitism, something is very wrong.

[ReaderY]

You want Room 12A next door.

I stopped arguing and went to the next room.

[Nige]

Was it a grey box? Full of Affleck and anti-semitism?

[Drewski]

You’re arguing from ignorance. Affleck has outright stated that he believes “zionists” do not have rights and are valid targets for rape, has called Hamas fighters on Oct 8 “heroes,” and has indeed called for the enslavement of all Israelis. Sometimes he says all zionists should be summarily killed without trial, sometimes arrested and given brief trials before execution, and sometimes arrested, tried fairly, and “almost certainly” executed. For a long stretch he posted several times a day about how zionists are "humaniform" and not human at all.

[Noscitur a sociis]

I am sorry my father’s family was murdered 80 years ago

Pushed off of a guard tower?

[Krayt]

You aren't more concerned about the lingering anti-semitism, thinly buried under ostensibly non-religious reasons to hate on Jews?

I distinctly heard "from the river to the sea", hundreds of times last night on the campus of UCLA.

For the sake of argument, I will believe your concerns are purely for the secular mistakes of the Israeli government, and not as a cover story for something more insidious. You should be aware you are being used as a useful idiot by such planners with less noble motivations.

I will keep saying it, creating a way to hate on Jews without it being "because they're Jews" was a brilliant invention.

By their actions you shall know them. "From the river to the sea", attacks on Jewish students, full antisemitism parterning up, in a way the tiki torchers only dreamed they did with Trump, and on a scale of millions, entire nations, not a few kooks.

So you and your thoughts are noble. You've uncovered a terrible tendency of humanity, bringing it to the masses.

This should be of concern.

[Moderation4ever]

So, my local newspaper, The Wisconsin State Journal, had an article about advances in self-driving trucks. While I think the self-driving trucks are still a ways off, I do think about what a radical change they would make in the economy. A huge loss for the job market as driving job would be decreased substantially. And benefits to trucking companies who could keep trucks on the road longer as computers don't tire and need breaks.

[Sarcastr0]

I have a ton of faith in capitalism to find jobs for humans; there will be displacement and transition costs but I don't foresee mass unemployment from AI.

Many very smart people disagree, however.

[Michael P]

This is one of the rare cases where I strongly agree with Sarcastr0. In my field, AI tends to makes people more productive. They can produce comparable output more quickly, or better output in the same time as before AI. (Not so much in my current specific job because of safety regulations and culture about tools needing to be qualified before use, but in software and system engineering more broadly, yes.) I suspect that's true for most knowledge worker jobs.

There will absolutely be dislocations and a lot of hard transitions into jobs that are not what people are used to, but I do not expect mass unemployment. In an extreme case, if a coal miner can learn to code, why can't a truck driver?

[Brett Bellmore]

"In an extreme case, if a coal miner can learn to code, why can’t a truck driver?"

"If" is the key word here. Most coal miners CAN'T learn to code, at least not productively, which is why that suggestion was taken so badly in the first place.

[Frank Drackman]

Isn't "Writing Code" what the guys in "Office Space" did? they all seemed pretty miserable. At the end Peter went to working construction and was much happier.

[Michael P]

Well, that was a bit tongue-in-cheek, but my broader thinking is that we've had similar changes that have had local (but admittedly severe) pain without "mass unemployment" as people move or re-skill.

I expect AI will affect a lot more people total, but over a longer period of time. The people with the most to fear are bureaucrats, whose jobs are particularly vulnerable to AI (because there's no objective right/wrong perspective for most of their output), followed by people who will be regulated by those bureaucrats trying to save their own jobs....

[loki13]

"In an extreme case, if a coal miner can learn to code, why can’t a truck driver?"

Two things-

Regarding your overall point, the issue with AI (assuming people are correct about it) is that it's the first revolution that will arguably displace a lot of white-collar, knowledge worker jobs. Yes, it does make all sorts of white-collar professions more productive, which means that you can have a lot fewer people (coders, lawyers, doctors, artists, writers, etc.) do more. And in some areas (call centers, etc.) it can seriously displace a lot of people.

It's not a given, but it looks quite possible, especially given the pace of advancement and adoption.

As to your quoted point ... AI can code. In fact, it's likely that a lot of the lower-end coding jobs (those that a truck driver might be able to get after retraining) will disappear.

This is why AI seems different than prior issues- before, it was tech taking out lower-end jobs. This is the first time that it appears that tech might be able to take out some of the jobs that we previously assumed required humans. Not all of them (I don't see AI arguing cases in court, or performing surgeries, or gathering the facts on the ground for investigative journalism), but a lot of them. After all, why pay an associate to do the first pass at a motion or brief if an AI can do it? (I am not looking forward to that day, by the way, and I fear it will be hear before too long).

[Nige]

AI is hugely expensive, guzzles enormous amounts of power, doesn't do the vast majority of the things it's asked to do well, still needs a bunch of actual humans employed in poorer countries to help it be even as bad as it is, and still needs actual humans to fix the AI outputs, if they can be bothered to fix them at all.

[loki13]

As someone who has been watching this with a great deal of interest over the last seven years, I think that you are incorrect in a lot of your assumptions.

The LLM AIs may not be our robot overlords, but their advancement in capabilities in the past three years alone has been staggering.

If you had told me four years ago that LLM AIs would be able to produce the type of graphics ... or write a passable legal document (with or without hallucinated citations), I would have laughed at you. For that matter, I can easily use AI to write a lot of simple code now.

But, you know, the future is uncertain. We will see!

[Nige]

Well of course they can, they scraped real art by real artists in a massive bout of plagiarism to feed their algorithms. It's not actual intelligence or creativity. All that cost and energy and management to draw up legal documents that can't be trusted and write some code? Just pay people properly, invent something we actually need.

[Brett Bellmore]

Training AI is hugely expensive and guzzles enormous amounts of power. Running AI is fairly economical. That's because the current AI's are REALLY inefficient at learning.

And I agree that, at present, the capabilities are limited, and it makes mistakes a human wouldn't. OTOH, it's also capable of doing stuff humans find really difficult, and can do it in a scalable way.

But the key thing is that AI is getting better, and we humans aren't. It's not hard to see where that ends.

The current issue is this: Human intellectual capabilities are distributed in a broad bell curve. Hence the titled of that book. Relatively few people are total morons, relatively few people are geniuses, and as you approach 100 IQ, defined as the median, the slope of the curve levels out before dropping again.

So, deleting the long winded explanation, the problem is that every IQ point the machines add, as they approach 100, displaces more people than the previous IQ point.

Back when machines were taking over jobs that didn't require much intelligence to do, most of the people being displaced could find new work because they were genuinely capable of doing mentally harder work, they were just doing dumb work because it needed doing. The few people genuinely that dumb we could just support somehow.

Now that they're starting to take over work that needs average intelligence to do, the displaced workers, most of whom actually have average IQs, CAN'T shift to new work, because they're already fully utilized. They're not really capable of doing the work that the machines can't do.

Now, ideally we'll find some niche that humans are really good at, and machines are inherently very bad at, and can't take over. But there doesn't seem to actually be such work, except for unusual people.

[Artifex]

"Now, ideally we’ll find some niche that humans are really good at, and machines are inherently very bad at, and can’t take over. But there doesn’t seem to actually be such work, except for unusual people."

At this point in time, that niche is actually figuring things out. How this trait stacks up with the capabilities of the average person, I have no idea. It is however, a point at which they are absurdly weak. You will find that they can either solve a task immediately or they are totally lost and completely unable to work their way to a solution. The human trait of debugging or slowly fighting through a tough problem to a solution doesn't seem to unfold in human fashion with the networks.

Where we seem to be going is a human doing the heavy conceptual lifting and the network manages the details. This raises the question of how many humans are really capable of heavy conceptual thinking. Is that a rare human trait ? I couldn't tell you.

[Nige]

'It’s not hard to see where that ends.'

Everybody fired, AIs doing everything, really badly, Republicans savagely opposing a universal income because poor people are lazy.

These aren't actually AIs. They don't have any IQ points at all. People are employed to filter out the worst of their messes. There's no reason for them to exist, other than to get out of paying people to do the same jobs, better. It's a dumb dead end.

[Brett Bellmore]

No, I agree, they aren't actually "intelligent", they just look like they're intelligent because embarrassingly little of what we do in our lives actually requires intelligence. Actual intelligence is an error handling routine, essentially. It's computationally expensive and glitchy, and we only resort to it when doing what worked before repeatedly fails.

The "AI"s are actually just laboriously distilled essence of "what worked before", without that error handling routine. They do a fabulous job of mimicking intelligence right up until they go off the rails, because there's nobody there to notice going off the rails.

They're really good at the stuff that doesn't require original thought, but that humans are bad at, like getting the grammar right, pasting together bits of pictures so that the seams aren't visible. They're really good at the stuff that's tedious. That impresses people.

But, like I said, that's most of what people do for a living, so they're going to have a huge impact on the job market.

[Nige]

Humans are actually pretty good at grammar, generally, and also good at creating images. They're reproducing stuff they've plagiarised off humans, it's not really that impressive. It doesn't alleviate tedium much if you have to painstakingly double-check the tedium-saving device, fix all its mistakes, and then get told how amazing these devices are.

[TwelveInchPianist]

It's also important to keep in mind that the principle at work in comparative advantage, not absolute advantage. If AI can code a million times more efficiently than a person, and, say, write legal briefs a million and ten times more efficiently, it still makes sense to have some humans writing code.

But in any event, people will produce a lot more stuff with AI. More food, medicine, cures for cancer, etc.

[Krayt]

People ask, is it ethical for robots to drive? Well, eventually people will ask, given robots are better drivers, is it ethical to let humans drive anymore?

Worse, given the quality of driver is proportional to experience, when humans do drive in the future, they will tend to suck more and more, as those who drove their whole life die out, then those who drove most of it, then all that are left are a few diehards and everyone else just dabbles in driving for fun once in awhile.

[Nige]

It's unethical to let anyone drive, cars are emitting CO2 and causing climate change.

[kramartini]

Given the advances in high level tools, it is becoming easier and easier to "code", as these tools allow the user to tell the computer what code to "write".

[jb]

I think the bigger question is does this result in even more income inequality, where most of the jobs that capitalism creates are low-quality and low-paying, while the people creating the AI and owning the trucks retain most of the delta in cost between the human and AI truckers.

[Krayt]

Look to history and maintain confidence.

Hey, Geo. Washington and friends, in 200 years, 98 % of people will no longer work on farms!

Politicians: Oh my god the unemployment! We need you to authorize us to take over the economy and direct things!

[jb]

Cool analogy that doesn't address the question I raised at all (since I was talking about income inequality not unemployment).

I think it's undeniably true that various waves of efficiency including the industrial revolution, assembly lines and even computerization were net positives to society because they resulted in better outcomes for people at both the middle and at the bottom of the income spectrum to be better off along with those at the top (i.e., the rising tide really was lifting all boats).

More recently, not so clear. Starting with the finance industry starting to leach a big portion out of the economy without doing anything useful in return in the 80s to the questionable value of the attention economy today, we've seen median real wages basically flatline and low wage purchasing power actually decline. Housing and food security is down (and notably, homelessness has been increasing). Rich people have a lot more money than they used to, though, and a lot of the economy is restructuring around serving their needs (see https://slate.com/business/2023/06/skiing-movie-theaters-casinos-amusement-parks-prices-upscale-leisure-industry.html ).

So sure, let's look at history. I see no reason to think that AI isn't going to make the problems I'm describing above worse rather than better.

[Mr. Bumble]

How Skynet began.

[Stephen Lathrop]

Moderation, I doubt you should expect presently any notable success for self-driving trucks which run under the guidance of present technology. The key advantage of trucks over rail has always been greater flexibility of operation in urban areas. On long-haul routes through the countryside, the best self-driving can do is improve trucking efficiency to bring it closer to railroad-like efficiency. Indeed, self-driving is already so little necessary for rail efficiency in rail operations that even though it would be far easier to implement than on roadways, no one seems to see the point of bothering to do it.

But in the cities, self-driving technology shows little sign of maturing out of its not-ready maybe-ever status. Capacity to anticipate pedestrian intent is critical to keeping traffic moving in urban areas long-ago designed to mix cargo transportation with foot traffic. Nothing like that capacity is present in self-driving technology as it exists now. Modifications to deliver that capacity with more-recent AI will need either to be hallucination-proofed, or worked around with some entirely new approach. Otherwise, expect self-driving technology in big cities to turn out to be a fiasco combining the worst features of grid-lock with random slaughter.

[Brett Bellmore]

Self-driving capabilities are already adequate for highway use, which is most of the miles for long haul trucks. You might adopt something like the system for freighters, where when you're near a port you get a local pilot; Truck drivers familiar with the local roads and conditions would board the truck outside a city, handle the local driving, and then get off as it returned to the long boring stretch on the expressway.

[Stephen Lathrop]

Interesting notion. So the containers arrive in multi-modal seaports, to be linked to truck drivers to pilot them one-by-one to other ports on the outskirts of town. There the containers get put on self-driving land conveyances, instead of on railroads for some reason, to continue their journey to another ex-urban port, there to get picked up by another truck driver pilot, to take them to their final destinations.

You might get enthusiastic support from truck drivers for that. Plenty of employment, and they get to stay home at night.

[Martinned2]

On the port end, why not use a crane to put the containers on a train, and use that to take the containers out of town? (Or put the port out of town to begin with, like the new Port of London Gateway.)

[Stephen Lathrop]

Particular ports operate in particular ways, and treat particular cargos and destinations differently.

A general answer might be that what you propose suggests transferring the container twice—to put it on the train, and take it off the train—instead of handling it once, to put it on a truck to drive it to a destination where a rail siding is lacking.

[Martinned2]

True, but for ports that are congested and/or in the middle of congested cities, that may well be worth it.

[Brett Bellmore]

The fundamental problem with the trains is that they don't handle the "last mile", (Which is often a lot more than just a mile!) so you have to offload onto a truck anyway.

This creates enough of an extra expense that for a lot of categories of cargo it's more economical to just go the whole way on a truck.

Trains really work well for bulk cargo going in very high volume between specific locations. And that IS a lot of cargo, but there's a lot of cargo that really doesn't fit that model.

[DaveM]

The killer application for chat-based AI is to attend status meetings. All the bots will join in the online conference, feed each other’s status summaries, and then the meeting’s AI moderator will summarize all the summaries and distribute that to the humans.

The first company to do this will wipe out an entire strata of middle management. Imagine never having to sit through another status update! Heaven.

[Dr. Ed 2]

No. We have had self-flying airplanes for 40 years now, and all we have done is reduce the crew from three to two. We still have a "pilot flying" and a "pilot monitoring" even though most of the flight is actually on autopilot.

Pilots are expensive when you realize how few hours a month the FAA permits them to be a pilot and no one's eliminating them...

I don't think that the public is going to tolerate heavy trucks on the highway without a human being in charge of the autopilot.

[Moderation4ever]

I live in a residential neighborhood and there are dogs aplenty. All are companion animals. Most are small, some medium size and a few larger breeds. A couple are hunting breeds and when I have talked to the owners, I ask them if they use the dog to hunt. The response I get is the animal failed to meet the standards for hunting and were adopted out as companion animals. You know where I am going and that is that Kristi Noem is a fool for writing about shooting her dog. Clearly there are rural hunting people that may understand the situation, but broadly Americans don't favor shooting a problem dog. Writing about shooting the dog is the equivalent of shooting yourself in the foot. Kristi can look forward to more years as Governor but can give up the idea of VP or eventually the Presidency.

[Mr. Bumble]

Not withstanding her stupid confession I don't think she ever had a chance to be the VP choice. More of a media construct.

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

.

her stupid confession

Telling the truth is generally a disqualifier in MAGAland.

[Mr. Bumble]

You can't handle the truth!

[Martinned2]

FYI, Colonel Jessup was not the good guy in that movie.

[Bob from Ohio]

Says you.

The bad guy was the negligent doctor btw.

[Krayt]

Bad guy doesn’t mean he wasn’t making a point. Just covering something up.

Michael Douglas in Falling Down also wasn't the good guy. His stunned reaction to changes in being valued as an engineer, then cast to the side, was still a valid point.

Ironic he'd be a hotter ticket than ever just a few years later.

[SRG2]

Trump might pick her on grounds of attraction and loyalty, not character nor competence. Cf. Alina Habba.

[Michael P]

Yes, M4e much prefers the Biden solution of keeping a supply of Secret Service agents around for your aggressive dog to bite.

[Brett Bellmore]

"Clearly there are rural hunting people that may understand the situation"

Speaking as somebody who grew up out in the country, and even now associates with farmers, once a dog starts killing chickens, there's not really much you can do with them; It's not the sort of thing dogs grow out of. And the dog bit people, too, making it unsuitable to be adopted out. And for rural people, dogs are domestic animals, mostly, not pets. So I can kind of understand what was going through her head.

But politically? Talking about it was unconscionably stupid for anybody who had more than local political ambitions.

[TwelveInchPianist]

Yup. I knew a guy that grew up on a farm in Ireland where they raised racing dogs. According to him a large percentage of the dogs met the same fate as Cricket, many at his hands.

I sure wasn't nuts about that, but if you truly want to associate with diverse people, you have to accept the fact that people often don't see things the same way you do.

That said, Noem certainly hurt her political chances.

[Stephen Lathrop]

Broadly, Americans are fine with pit bulls. Many think ignorantly that deliberately-inbred characteristics can be reliably corrected by affectionate and skilled owner attention. Sometimes it works.

As for Noem and her wire-haired pointer, was it male or female? Even a promising female pointer of any breed probably needs at least two years experience, maybe more, to become a good gun dog. More for males. Few males will ever rival the best females in the field. The best use for hunting-talented male pointers is to keep them around to breed more females. But of course you have to be patient for at least a few years, and hunt the males, to discover what you've got.

All gun dogs need daily exercise in large doses. A pointer on the hunt covers more distance in an hour or two than the hunter can in a day. If you want to hunt all day, you have to deploy the dogs in shifts to avoid exhausting the dogs. Their enthusiasm far outpaces even an outsized capacity for exercise. To keep dogs like that fit and in good mental health requires daily exercise in giant amounts. If you can't provide that—if you are not fit enough yourself, or too busy with other tasks—you need a different breed of dog—something more like a beagle or a golden retriever.

I hunted upland birds for years with a companion who bred German shorthairs. The young dogs wanted to romp, but also got a kick out of pointing tweety birds, grasshoppers, or maybe the scent of an already-departed game bird. It was astonishing how much some of those youngsters learned with experience—about how to distinguish what the hunter was after, about where to find the birds, about how to work running birds toward the hunter, and about how to control the birds when on point.

When a dog like that is on the hunt, not just the hunter will follow them around. If a covey of chukar partridges gets up, a hunter might have to use care to avoid shooting a hawk which has been waiting its chance above, to swoop in and take a partridge for itself.

Hawks, by the way, are the reason hunting dogs exist at all. If hawks did not exist to attack them from the air, all the upland game birds would just fly away before any hunter got close enough to take a shot.

[Brett Bellmore]

"Sometimes it works."

I knew somebody who kept them, he said they just had a sort of genetic need for occasional violence, but that you could satisfy it harmlessly by just giving them something inanimate to go after occasionally, like a chew toy, or even a paper grocery bag. His dogs were friendly enough, from what I could tell. But they could turn a grocery bag into a cloud of confetti in seconds.

I think a lot of their bad rep comes from people who have the wrong reasons for owning them...

[Frank Drackman]

She should have just killed her Baby, then she'd be a hero

[ReaderY]

One of the great settler-colonialist civilizations of the past millenium was Islamic civilization. In the Middle Ages and early modern period it was more technologically advanced. This gave it a big head start on the West in settler-colonialism, sweeping through North Africa, India, and colonizing parts of China, Asia-Pacific, and Russia. It successfully colonized large swathes of Europe. The Moors conquered and held Iberia for centuries. The Ottoman empire conquered the Balkans, Ukraine, even parts of Poland, and twice besieged Vienna. Even after the Europeans gained a technological advantage beginning in the late 17th century and began driving the Ottomans back, various Islamic empires were still subjugating and colonizing parts of Asia, to be surpassed by the West only in the 18th or 19th centuries.

It was a slave empire. Arab traders captured and dealt in slaves in the millions, rivalling the West. They enslaved a few million white Europeans, but most of their slaves were black.

The various Islamic redemptionist movements currently at work, even more than the American Southern redemptionist movement of the 19th and early 20th centuries, openly seek to restore the greatness of Islamic settler-colonialist empire, including slavery. And their underlying motivation is essentially the same as the American Redemptionists. How could it be that we could be defeated by our natural inferiors, people who rightfully ought to be our slaves?

There are many strategic and tactical similarities between the American Redemptionists and today’s Islamic Redemptionists. Both were defeated in war and then occupied by a much-resented occupation. Both sought stab-in-the-back explanations for their defeats. Both portray the victors as fundamentally illegitimate. Although the Ottoman Empire was never colonized by the West and and after its defeat in World War I was occupied for a couple of decades in the early 20th Century, not much longer than the European empires it allied with (Austria-Hungary and Germany; its enemy Russia also suffered a similar fate to some extent) and which were similarly occupied and split up, Islamic Redemptionists have managed to update the American Redemptionist terminology and have turned the carpetbaggers of old who propped former slaves up into power into “colonists.” As occurred in many parts of Europe, a number of former provinces of the Ottoman Empire were given independence after an occupation; this behavior, which mirrored what happened with European empires, got protrayed as fundamentally colonialist. (The British promised recognition of Palestine as a homeland for Jews using language not all that different from documents promising similar recognition for Native American tribal land and sovereignty claims among others, but nobody thinks that made Native Americans British colonists).

A second tactic is a complete distortion of history. Much as the American Redemptionists claimed the Civil War had nothing to do with slavery, Islamic Redemptionists have flatly pretended the long history of Islamic settler-colonialism never happened. They’ve ignored the fact that they started the settler-colonialism game by invading Europe, colonizing large parts of it, and enslaving millions of Europeans. They ignored the fact that they were winning the settler-colonialism game for hundreds of years, and it was only a couple of centuries ago that the Europeans even began catching up with them. They portray settler-colonialism as an entirely European thing, not something they started and had had the upper hand in for a long time. The way the Islamic Redemptionists tell the tale, you would think they were just sitting calmly doing nothing when these Europeans sicced these Jews on them to rule over and oppress them, much the way the American Redemptionists suggested they were just minding their own business when the imperialist Yankees sicced the Negros on them.

I think the fact that they were historically a large-scale slave-based empire, and their redemptionists openly seek to restore slavery, goes a long way to explaining how closely their attitude towards Jewish independence resembles the American redemptionists attitude towards Negro political power. The American Redemptionists blew up every ordinary incident that happened during Reconstruction into a tale of savage atrocities. The way the American Redemptionists told it, Reconstruction was all one long horror story of atrocities, oppression, murder, rape, and theft. They portrayed the Yankees as seeking to wipe out their culture and way of life. Islamic Redemptionists have taken similar tactics, portraying everything the Jews ever did as one big act of “genocide.” Just as American Redemptionists flatly lied about their history, Islamic Redemptionists try not only to pretend they don’t have a long history of settler-colonialism, conqest and slavery, they have attempted the even bigger whopper of trying to pretend that the Jews who were there long before they first conquored and colonized Judea aren’t native to it.

The restoration of pure Islamic Rule has been closely followed by the restoration of slavery in the Islamic State, in Yemen, in Somalia, and elsewhere. Like the American Redemptionists before them, the Islamic Redemptionists are incensed that they were defeated by people they regard as their imferiors, and not only that, a people they regard as naturally and rightfully their slaves have been given power and in places even been in a position to rule over them. Like the American Redemptionists before them, they seek to restore the natural order.

Hamas, like other Islamic Redemptionist movements, seeks a “free Palestine” in the same way the American Redemptionists sought a free South. It seeks ultimately to enslave the area’s Jews, much as the Islamic State and the Houthis have enslaved religious minorities.

And in doing so, it has like the American Redeemers taken advantage of a certain favoring of the underdog and the defeated, a certain wistfulness and nostalgia for traditional rural culture and traditional loyalties, that have long been part of both the Western right and the Western left. And it has in particular taken advantage of Western public opinion’s extreme ignorance of history.

After all, the American Redeemers were highly successful for nearly a century in leveraging their defeat in the civil war and much-detested occupation during Reconstruction into practically a victory by exploiting the same sympathies, nostalgia, and prejudices Islamic redemptionists seek to exploit, turning history utterly on its head, portraying themselves as the victims, their Yankee occupiers as genocidal colonizing oppresessors, and the Negros as their tools and muscle.

The American Redemptionists succeeded as well as they did because of prejudices, deeply rooted in the American psyche, which made it easy to see African-Americans as brutal and savage, as inherently inclined to steal and kill. If Islamic Redemptionists succeed, it will be because of similar deep-seated prejudices about Jews.

[Nige]

See also the Roman Empire. Clearly, Roman Empire Redemptionists are the cause of the brutal racism and expansionism of the various European colonial powers. Or something.

I don’t suppose it’s worth pointing out that one important reason for the rise of Islamic fundamentalists who impose sharia law wherever they rule is because the US decided they would make a great asset against the Russians during the Cold War, so they gave them arms and funding and training and intelligence and covert backing, and everything that has followed has been disastrous blowback, not some misty-eyed nostalgia for the Ottoman Empire, which at its heights, for all its faults, was tolerant of Christian and Jews? Nothing at all like modern extemist Islamic states?

Underdogs my eye, the western powers and Russia fucked up the Middle East in competing to control strategic areas and resources, and have shown absolutely no talent for unfucking it.

[ReaderY]

Nobody is seeking to restore the Roman empire. But Hamas and other Islamist groups, like the Islamic State, the Houthis in Yemen, and others, are in fact ultimately seeking to restore the glory of the Islamic Calphate, last manifested in the Ottoman Empire, which was in fact a more successful colonial civilization until surpassed by the West a few centuries ago, kept a still-sizable part of its original colonial right up until WEI, and was defeated and crushed only in WWI.

Lots of countries have seen themselves as unjustly defeated and humiliated – the Confederates, the Germans after WWI, the Russians more recently. And they have tended to characterize the victors and what they see as their servants as evil. The Confederates demonized African-Americans. Germans after WWI and Hamas today demonize Jews. Russia has been demonizing the Ukrainians (Nazis etc.) It’s been a common reaction. Indeed, if you compare Putin’s descriptions of Ukrainians with Nazi Germany’s and Hamas’ description of Jews and the ex-Confederates description of African-Americans, you do tend to see some common patterns.

All of these events, from the Civil War and Reconstruction to the end of the Ottoman Empire to Gaza and Ukraine,have been fairly recent and motivating history, not irrelevant distant past history.

[Nige]

The Roman Empire kinda WAS restored: they called it the British Empire.

[Sarcastr0]

Wannabes.

[Noscitur a sociis]

Hahaha what?

[ReaderY]

There’s a good argument to be made that the Islamic Caliphate was the real successor to the Roman Empire. They controlled Constantinople. They controlled the parts of Africa which had been the Roman Empire’s breadbasket and were for a time the only civilization able to sustain large-scale urban cities. (After the Vandals, well, vandalized northern Africa, Rome went from being a city of half a million to a city of less than a tenth that in about a generation. When the Muslims conquered it, they aquired the ability to feed large urban populations that came with it, an ability which was perhaps the key indicator of real imperial power until the Industrial Revolution.) They preserved Greek learning which became lost to Christian Europe until close to the Renaissance. Etc.

Arguably the British only eclipsed their Roman successor role sometime in the 18th century, perhaps even the 19th.

[Alpheus W Drinkwater]

I agree with everything you wrote, except the Caliphate did not control Constantinople.

[ReaderY]

The Ottoman Empire, which technically was the last Islamic Caliphate (the Sultan also had the title Caliph right up to WWI), conquored Constantinople in 1453. It was mostly beating the West for nearly a thousand years, from the first Islamic Jihad until perhaps the late 17th century. And it was mostly holding its own until sometime in the 18th.

[ReaderY]

Look, it’s arguable the Western powers fucked up the peace with Germany after WWI and with Russia after the Cold War. But that doesn’t mean Ukrainiians are really Nazis or really stole the land their country is located on as Putin regularly claims. Nor does it mean Jews, today or in the 1930s, are or were demons or criminals as a people or nation.

Jews are hardly alone here. In addition to the African-American and Ukrainian examples, Nazi Germany also regularly accused the Czechs and Poles of atrocities against Germans in their territories in the period leading up to the respective invasions.

[ReaderY]

The misty-eyed nostalgia for the greatness of Islamic civilization past and a belief they were unjustly cheated of the greatness due them preceded the US arming them. But the US arming them certainly helped them take action on it.

[Bwaaah]

I think Frank Drackman puts this together more succinctly, not relying on the “lens” of historicism to reach the conclusion.

How much should I rely on such sweeping history/philosophy-based stories of [fill in the group] when I observe little likeness between those stories and the nature of actual group members with whom I have interacted? (I trust you, but I don’t trust your people?)

Is history an accurate “lens” through which to view the present? Can history be trusted in the hands of its tellers? (Doesn’t it matter which teller?)

I don’t understand how so many people who are offended by racism turn so easily to other types of groupist thinking, as if racism isn’t just an unusually prevalent and pernicious example of stereotyping inherent in groupist thinking.

I give extra weight to my direct experience in judging people, despite the limitations of my anecdotal existence. If you’re looking for a drinking buddy, your best bet is to try the Irish. And if you’re looking to examine suspicions about Jews, Muslims should be your best bet. For skepticism about the motives of government, almost any Russian will do. But who should you trust? The people you know to be trustworthy, mostly setting aside the stories of their people.

For example, I trust the Iranian government to behave pretty much as it says, and find Islamic history to be pretty uninformative about the matter.

Anyway, I’m glad to hear a lot less references to Black people this year. I don’t know any group of people, particularly in the U.S., so routinely pigeon-holed into blathering groupist narratives by people within and outside the group. Anybody interested in lightening up on groupist pigeon-holding of dark skinned people?

[ReaderY]

My basic argument has been that the Zionist atrocity and settler-Colonialist tool-of-the-West stories are basically cribs of the Southern Redeemer Reconstruction-was-horrible, oppressive occupation, and negro atrocity stories. Further, the oft-repeated attitude towards Jews and Zionists as utterly depraved and evil as exemplified by (say) Jonathan Affleck is a close crib of what Southern redeemers said about black people.

Pointing that out is not “appropriating the black experience.” It’s just pointing out facts.

Similarly, attempting to explain it by pointing out parallels is not “appropriating the black experience” either. It’s legitimate historical analysis.

[Bwaaah]

I don't dispute any of that, and actually found your comment to be insightful analysis. I found it not only compelling, but sufficiently sensible that I had to remind myself about problems of reliance on history and how, for good and bad, individual personhood is easily lost in that.

[DaveM]

A fascinating essay, and quite unique. Well done! The history of the Islamic empire is completely ignored in the West. Lots of food for thought here.

N.B. I had to go look up "redemptionist", but the dictionary was nearly useless ("redeptionist", n., A monk of an order founded in 1197; -- so called because the order was especially devoted to the redemption of Christians held in captivity by the Mohammedans. Called also Trinitarian; A proponent of redemptionism.") After poking around a bit, I found another essay from which I could get the meaning. If there's an easier word for this, it might help others to use it instead of this somewhat technical term of art.

[ReaderY]

Wilipedia uses the simpler term Redeemer. I think I used “redemptionist” because “redeemer” implies someone who has succeeded while the more awkward term “redemptionist” includes advocates and failed attempts.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Redeemers

[SRG2]

goes a long way to explaining how closely their attitude towards Jewish independence resembles the American redemptionists attitude towards Negro political power.

I made a related observation after reading Martin Gilbert's book, "In Ishmael's House". When you've spent centuries regarding a certain group as third-class citizens at best, that will condition your attitude to their later change of status, including economic/political advancement.

[John F. Carr]

In the category of headlines that would puzzle our past selves: "George W. Bush’s portraits of veterans are heading to Disney World" (AP, May 1 2024)

The paintings of service members and veterans will be displayed for a year at Epcot’s American Adventure pavilion starting next month. Accompanying each painting is a veteran biography written by the former president.

It's a nice move. Bush still has a long, long way to go to catch up to Carter's post-presidential good deeds.

[The Margrave of Azilia]

The voters did a good thing by electing Carter to the post-Presidency.

[Brett Bellmore]

I was not terribly impressed with Carter at the time, I have since come to appreciate just how much worse Presidents can be; There's something to be said for mostly harmless mediocrity.

Though his post-presidential career endorsing the legitimacy of despots' rigged elections didn't help my opinion of him any.

[Longtobefree]

I know of Fifty-three American diplomats and citizens who would disagree with "mostly harmless mediocrity".

(The hostages were formally released into United States custody the day after the signing of the Algiers Accords, just minutes after American President Ronald Reagan was sworn into office)

[Frank Drackman]

Loved how the Ear-Ronians waited until Ronaldus Maximus had taken the Oath of Orifice before letting the hostages jet take off, they hated Jimmuh almost as much as they hated the Shah

[Stephen Lathrop]

And an even farther way to go to catch up with John Singleton Copley. I have seen Bush described as a surprisingly talented painter. Note that the metric of surprise differs from the metric of talent.

[ThePublius]

Bullshit I have read here.

Nige on Tuesday:
(about the protests): “they are peaceful and they include lots of Jews.” Ha, ha, ha.

David Nieporent 3 days ago
“The vaccine did work, and actually caused no harm to any people. (Well, I’m sure someone, somewhere got in a car accident on the way to get vaccinated.)”

The CDC and Astra-Zeneca have both come out reporting on the harm caused by the vaccines, including blood clots and myocarditis.

EXCLUSIVE: CDC Found Evidence COVID-19 Vaccines Caused Deaths

[ThePublius]

more:
https://www.conservativewoman.co.uk/new-paper-on-czech-population-level-vaccination-data-disproves-claims-vaccines-are-safe-and-effective/

[Sarcastr0]

As DMN pointed out, with such a low threshold of harm you can gin up exactly the same outrage about aspirin.

You're fully in cranktown now! Epoch times, and a preprint (no peer review!) from a British crank site ("Whether on climate, gender, relations between the sexes or race, it can feel as if we are entering a new Dark Age of anti-reason. Despite Brexit, the battle to subvert it continues").

Banger from the preprint: "Between June 2021 and September 2021, virtually no COVID-related deaths were recorded in the Czech Republic"

And the SHOCKING conclusion: "Given these results are for all-cause mortality, and Covid-19 mortality is a small subset of this, they show that observational data is so biased it cannot be used to support any claim by the authorities that the Covid-19 vaccines were proved effective or safe."
That's a pretty janky conclusion, but it is not 'Yet more evidence to disprove claims that vaccines are safe and effective.'

You dumb, deluded little man.

[loki13]

Well, it seems that Publius has fully gone down the rabbit hole.

Just recently, he posted the breaking news that Trump was "set up" according to recently released court documents, and demanded everyone read the article (despite everyone already knowing, based on the source, that it was BS). And when people read the article, it was quickly understood that it was BS.

So I will put forth this same challenge to Publius that I do for others who like to spam "breaking news" and the like from these types of sources. How about you keep track of what you are claiming, and then re-visit it after six months. See how often your awesome amazing and breaking news turns out to be true, or important, or relevant ... at all. Or if you're just spreading more BS because you are being told things that you want to believe.

Critical thinking is something that seems to be in remarkably short supply these days. A good rule of thumb is that, wherever you are on the political spectrum, if you are reading something from a "news" source that keeps telling you want you want to hear, you might need to broaden your horizons.

[ThePublius]

See my response to Sarcastr0.

Astra-Zeneca admits to vaccine harm.

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/astrazeneca-admits-covid-19-vaccine-160227271.html?fr=sycsrp_catchall

CDC admits to vaccine harm.

And on the "non violent" part - no comment here?

Yes, let's revisit in 6 months, or a year, or whatever. it turns out, as you might be aware, but probably ignore, that many of the so-called conspiracy theories surrounding Trump and the election turned out to be true! Russian collusion - false. FBI aided in this deception - true. Hunter's laptop - true. And on and on.

[Krayt]

"In very rare cases". For rhetorical purposes, one leaves that out to generate a larger panic in the reader.

Everyone understands new drugs may have issues in rare cases.

[Sam Bankman-Fried]

AZ wasn’t distributed in America. Trump’s own appointee appointed Mueller.

[ThePublius]

duplicate post

[ThePublius]

There's no need for personal insults if you can truly make your case.

From what I have gleaned in the media over the last few years, there is indeed harm from the vaccines. To say there's no harm, as in zero harm, is a lie.

From the CDC:
"Cases of myocarditis and pericarditis have rarely been observed after COVID-19 vaccination in the United States and evidence from multiple vaccine safety monitoring systems in the United States and around the globe supports a causal association between mRNA COVID-19 vaccines (i.e., Moderna or Pfizer-BioNTech) and myocarditis and pericarditis."

https://www.cdc.gov/vaccines/covid-19/clinical-considerations/myocarditis.html

That's not "no harm." So, go ahead, attack this source.

You deal in fallacy. Ad hominem - attacking me, and attacking the source. Try constructing a non-fallacious response.

[Nige]

You do remember that healthy young men were dropping dead of heart attacks all the time before covid? The silent killer?' So, millions and millions of doses given out, young men still occasionally and tragically drop dead of heart attacks. Myocarditis is a risk of *covid.* Millions and millions of people caught covid. Rise in myocarditis isn't just post-vaccine, it's also post-covid. I think this is way less clear-cut than you and that article are trying to make it.

[Sarcastr0]

YOU deal in medical ignorance.

As I said, if you want to set your threshold at 'no risk' then you come against aspirin too.

[Krayt]

To say there’s no harm, as in zero harm, is a lie.

But to say that, leaving off “in very rare cases”, is also a lie, and a bigger one.

I recall an Isaac Asimov statement, “To say the world is flat is wrong. But to say the world is round is also wrong. But if you think saying the world is round is just as wrong as saying the world is flat, is wronger than either.”

[Sam Bankman-Fried]

The earth is an oblate spheroid.

[ThePublius]

"with such a low threshold of harm you can gin up exactly the same outrage about aspirin."

You're the one always complaining about moving the goalposts!

Sure, many things are a matter of degree. I would argue that Tylenol causes more harm than the covid vaccines have caused, causing about 35% of the liver failure experienced. But the vaccines did not cause ZERO harm. And, the government was requiring you to take Tylenol, or firing you if you didn't or not allowing you to fly if you didn't, and so on.

[Sarcastr0]

As many here have pointed out, common parlance is not to include 'very low risk' because every single medical intervention would count.
If everything is a risk, nothing is.

Normal people understand that.
You're trying for a 'technically correct' debate-club win, but it requires forgetting everything about human connotation.

No one but you is that dumb. Well, I guess that UK blog you shared may be.

[Brett Bellmore]

But as has also been pointed out, the government never tried to force everyone to take aspirin. If it had, you'd have seen the same kind of pushback.

[Nige]

A few million people weren't in the process of dying from mild headaches.

[Nige]

“they are peaceful and they include lots of Jews.” Ha, ha, ha.

I've seen no real evidence otherwise. Most of the confirmed violence has been from counter-protesters. Are you saying there are no Jews among the protesters?

[ThePublius]

Don't you read the news? Holy cow.

"UCLA forced to go remote amid concerns over violent antisemitic agitators"
"Anti-Israel protesters violently clash with NYPD cops outside City College of New York"
"Israel-Hamas war protesters and police clash on Texas campus, Columbia University begins suspensions"

Google it.

And now you attribute all of the violence to counter protesters. Typical. Blame it on the Jews.

[Nige]

‘Concerns,’ no indication of actual violence.

Send in the police, there will usually be violence. US police are a violent bunch.

Did the three-hour counter-protester assault suddenly not happen?

Since there are Jews amongst the protesters, you also are blaming the Jews.

[ThePublius]

"Jewish Yale student journalist stabbed in the eye with Palestinian flag during protest. A Jewish Yale University student journalist reporting on an anti-Israeli protest at the Ivy League school Saturday night was stabbed in the eye with a Palestinian flag, while her assailant has gone unpunished."

https://nypost.com/2024/04/21/us-news/jewish-yale-student-stabbed-in-the-eye-with-palestinian-flag-during-protest/

[ThePublius]

"Some attacks have turned physical, students say
Eden Yadegar, a junior at Columbia University, described how Jewish students were attacked by people wielding sticks outside of the university library, and how she has been mocked on campus as well as on social media.

“We have been attacked by sticks outside our library. We have been attacked by angry mobs and we have been threatened to ‘Keep f—ing running,’” said Yadegar, president of Students Supporting Israel at Columbia University"

https://www.cnn.com/2024/02/29/business/antisemitism-college-harvard-upenn/index.html

[ThePublius]

"At Yale, Sahar Tartak was stabbed in the eye. At Columbia, Jonathan Lederer’s Israeli flag was burned and he was hit in the face."

https://www.thefp.com/p/they-were-assaulted-on-campus-for

[Sarcastr0]

You are not posting anything relevant to the 'lots of Jews' statement you purport to be coming at.

[zztop8970]

He's responding to the first part of that statement, that you somehow missed - “they are peaceful "

[Nige]

But they are. It's when the counter-protesters enter the mix that scuffles start, and they all seem relatively minor, until the three-hour attack on the encampment.

[zztop8970]

They are not., and you've benn given examples. Breaking the windows of Hamilton Hall was not in response ot any counter-protest.

[Nige]

The middle one didn’t even happen during the protests, and you're still pulling out isolated incidents that seem to arise from scuffles between protesers and counter-protesters, while the attack last night indicates it's the counter-protesters who are determined and willing to use violence.

[WuzYoungOnceToo]

David Nieporent 3 days ago
“The vaccine did work, and actually caused no harm to any people. (Well, I’m sure someone, somewhere got in a car accident on the way to get vaccinated.)”

Yeah, there are some subjects on which he is either a complete moron, a willing propaganda tool...or both.

[ThePublius]

Biden admin censorship.

"Having obtained and reviewed tens of thousands of emails and other relevant nonpublic documents, the Committee and Select Subcommittee can provide a more complete picture of how and the extent to which the Biden White House coerced companies to suppress free speech," the report states. "Big Tech Changed Their Content Moderation Policies Because of Biden White House Pressure. The Biden White House pressure campaign largely succeeded in 2021. In the weeks and months following the start of the White House pressure campaign. Facebook, YouTube, and Amazon all changed their content moderation policies."

https://townhall.com/tipsheet/katiepavlich/2024/05/01/biden-white-house-censorship-official-cant-answer-basic-questions-about-the-first-amendment-n2638525

So, who's the threat to democracy again?

[Brett Bellmore]

Republicans, obviously, since "democracy" just means rule by Democrats.

[Nige]

'So, who’s the threat to democracy again?'

The guy who lost an election and tried to overthrow the election result in order to remain in power and who has promised to instal personal loyalists in order to carry out his orders regardless of legal merit so he can explicitly go after his political and media enemies and who has promised to round up millions of people and put them in camps, sending red state national guard into blue states if necessary.

Wow, that was easy.

[ThePublius]

'But Trump...' the fallback argument.

The threat to democracy is on the part of those in power who censor the media to support their cause, their narrative. That's what I was referring to.

[Nige]

You asked the question. The answer remains obvious. Putting pressure on social media to remove dangerous lies about a disease and a vaccine during a global pandemic killing millions might be excessive, might be desperation, or might just be exasperation, but it's basically about trying to save lives, even if misguided. Trying to overturn an election you lost is explicitly shitting on democracy. Oh, and Trump constantly, endlessly, remorselessly put pressure on social media sites, demanding they remove posts and ban users he didn't like, not out of public interest, but because they were being mean about him. Let's not forget that tit-bit.

[ThePublius]

The problem with censorship is those who are doing the censoring - determining what's true or not, which is always according to their views, their preferred narrative.

Much of what was censored regarding covid and the vaccines turned out to be true.

Much of what was censored during the election cycle turned out to be true.

No censorship is the only honest and truthful position.

Let opposing voices be heard, from both sides.

[Nige]

Their preferred narrative was that covid was killing people and spreading everywhere and people needed to take vaccines, which were safe. I get that the right decided for political reasons to claim the opposite, but that was fucking stupid.

‘Much of what was censored regarding covid and the vaccines turned out to be true’

What? The micro-chips? The culling of human population for the Great Reset? The poisoning of blood? The mountains of bodies?

‘No censorship is the only honest and truthful position.’

Perhaps, but then again, when you’ve decided that your political position is going to involve automatic polarisation of even the issue of public health in a pandemic, meaning believing the stupidest fucking shit that can get people killed by the thousand, you would claim that.

'Let opposing voices be heard, from both sides'

They weren't the 'other side.' The 'other side' were people who had intelligent criticisms and concerns. They could barely be heard over the screaming of things like 'the vaccine is asbestos!' It's just the purest most malicious bullshit.

[Ed Grinberg]

"It’s just the purest most malicious bullshit."
Nige, I think you're pretty damn malicious. Does that mean I get to censor you?

[Nige]

I have absolutely no doubt that you would if you could.

[bernard11]

But Trump…’ the fallback argument.

The accurate argument.

[David Nieporent]

So, who’s the threat to democracy again?

The people who caused a bunch of universities to change their demonstration policies after calling the heads of the universities in to testify and threatening them?

[Krayt]

after [Congress] calling the heads of the universities in to testify and threatening them?

I am informed this, when applied to giant media Internet companies, had no effect, either being forced to stand tall before Congress and explain why they weren’t censoring harrassment the way the politicians wanted, or being threatened with section 230 wiping, causing hundreds of billions in stock valuation loss as their business model collapses and they become a target rich environment for suing lawyers.

Oddly, in spite of both of the above having had no effect, I am assured, nevertheless they started censoring harrassment soon thereafter, including the harrassing tweets of political opponents.

This was out of the kindness of their own, voluntary hearts, as good citizens.

[Nige]

'I am informed this, when applied to giant media Internet companies, had no effect'

None you've actually identified, unlike here.

[tylertusta]

We're going to hear from the Georgia Court of Appeals within the next few days on whether they will take up Trump & Co's appeal over the DQ matter.

[not guilty]

The certificate of service on the application for interlocutory appeal is dated March 29, 2024. I think the deadline for acting on the application is 45 days. That will be Monday, May 13.

If no pretrial appeal is granted, the prosecution should move expeditiously to set a trial date. Sometime this summer should be suitable.

[tylertusta]

The Court of Appeals typically acts on these at around 30 days, so we're in the zone, so to speak.

[tylertusta]

If no pretrial appeal is granted,

McAfee continues to work through the case even though he certified an appeal. He still retains jurisdiction.

the prosecution should move expeditiously to set a trial date. Sometime this summer should be suitable.

Even if the court of appeals doesn’t take up the appeal, the idea that McAfee is starting a trial in the summer is laughable.

And that’s not even counting for McAfee possibly having to schedule hearing(s) on Presidential immunity after the end of June.

[not guilty]

Well, the trial court and the prosecution were prepared to try Kenneth Chesebro and Sidney Powell last October, but plea agreements were reached.

[tylertusta]

Come on- those are defendants who didn't raise objections and were basically sprinting to resolve the case in order to obtain what is effectively a slap on the wrist.

On the other hand, the remaining defendants are being tried as a group and are making pre-trial motions and appeals. There's a lot to untangle with the case yet, and there are more motions by the defense that have yet to be filed.

[TwelveInchPianist]

Colorado passed a law preventing sexual assault defendants from introducing evidence of prior sexual contact with the defendant. Seems like that would be pretty important for a jury to know.

[Martinned2]

Aren't jury trials great? You end up having to choose between excluding relevant evidence and prejudicing the jury.

[Brett Bellmore]

That's not a necessary component of jury trials, though. It's a necessary component of minimizing their impact on trial outcomes.

[The Margrave of Azilia]

(Judges, in contrast, are never prejudiced despite hearing boatloads of inflammatory evidence.)

[Martinned2]

They might well be, but at least you can give them regular training to minimise prejudice, and force them to write a judgment setting out their reasons for reaching the conclusions that they did.

More generally, in a system like the Dutch where there are no juries, there is also no law of evidence. (Or barely.) The Dutch law of evidence can be summarised in a single sentence: All probative evidence is admissible, except if it is unlawfully obtained.

[The Margrave of Azilia]

That may be gouda nough for the Dutch, but trying to implement that in the U. S. would be tilting at windmills.

[Martinned2]

That's true for many other sensible policies too. Generally what I do on VC is to mention them occasionally, while trying not to wear out everybody's patience.

[Alpheus W Drinkwater]

A Dutch person once told me that the old Gouda pun only works in English because the Dutch pronunciation is nothing like goo-da. When I asked him how the Dutch actually pronounced it, he told me I wouldn't be able to pronounce it, that it was very guttural and like nothing in the English language.

[Martinned2]

True

[TwelveInchPianist]

"They might well be, but at least you can give them regular training to minimize prejudice,"

What kind of training, and how does such "training" differ from evidence that should be subjected to challenge by the defense?

For example, I've heard of Title IX investigators being given "training" that women making rape accusations rarely lie, or that people who experience trauma testify in a certain way that may seem non-credible. That sort of thing seems like it should be presented at trial and subject to challenge, if used at all.

[Martinned2]

I suspect that you may not be a fan of this then: https://www.lawgazette.co.uk/news/judicial-induction-training-to-tackle-implicit-bias/5106322.article

[David Nieporent]

force them to write a judgment setting out their reasons for reaching the conclusions that they did.

"I believed witness A but not witness B." I fail to see what that adds.

[Noscitur a sociis]

More generally, in a system like the Dutch where there are no juries, there is also no law of evidence. (Or barely.) The Dutch law of evidence can be summarised in a single sentence: All probative evidence is admissible, except if it is unlawfully obtained.

It's so cute when these countries try to play at having a real legal system!

[TwelveInchPianist]

Why would telling the jury that the couple had a sexual relationship prejudice them?

[WuzYoungOnceToo]

prejudicing the jury

All evidence relevant to a case is going to prejudice a jury to some extent in one way or another if they pay any attention to it. That's the whole point of presenting evidence...to convince the jury that your claims are the factually correct ones. The issue isn't simply prejudice but "unfair prejudice", and whether or not the risk of such outweighs the evidence's probative value.

[Noscitur a sociis]

You end up having to choose between excluding relevant evidence and prejudicing the jury.

Again, I'm probably closer to you than most people here on how valuable a jury system really is, but this seems like a nonsequitur. Rules of exclusion like this one don't allow judges to use the evidence either!

[Zarniwoop]

It strikes me as a really bad idea to have that as a categorical rule.

It’s not hard to come up with bad scenarios if the info is automatically excluded, and just as easy to come up with bad scenarios if the info is always admissible.

[TwelveInchPianist]

"and just as easy to come up with bad scenarios if the info is always admissible."

What would a bad scenario look like with respect to the fact this sort of evidence?

I don't know how a jury could evaluate testimony about the complaining witness's consent without knowing whether or not they were in a relationship.

[jb]

"I don’t know how a jury could evaluate testimony about the complaining witness’s consent without knowing whether or not they were in a relationship."

What, why? It's just as easy to give consent to someone who you just met thirty minutes ago as to not consent to someone you've been having sex with for 30 years.

I probably don't agree with the categorical rule here, but it's definitely not the case that this information is essential to evaluating all claims on the topic.

[Brett Bellmore]

Sure, it's possible, but if you're trying to evaluate a "he said, she said" situation in the absence of other evidence, you're going to rationally be a lot more inclined to believe that there wasn't consent if they just met, than if you know that there's a history of previous consent.

This is a rational inference that the judiciary don't want people making, not an irrational one.

[Nige]

This is probably why it’s being excluded,* because previous consent has nothing to do with current consent, if current consent is withdrawn. There’s no ‘most likely’ about it. People get raped by their partners all the time.

*Ah, I see, ref NG below. Situation normal.

[David Nieporent]

What, why? It’s just as easy to give consent to someone who you just met thirty minutes ago as to not consent to someone you’ve been having sex with for 30 years.

The question isn't ease of consent, but likelihood of consent.

[jb]

Yes, but TIP's claim was that they *couldn't* evaluate the testimony without that information, not that it would be helpful in evaluating the claim.

In any case, I have no idea if the information is more likely to be prejudicial than helpful. Most sources seem to agree that at least as many women are raped by partners than strangers, so it doesn't seem like the inference that because they were partnered the sex was consensual is very strong, at least in cases where sexual assault is asserted.

[Noscitur a sociis]

Most sources seem to agree that at least as many women are raped by partners than strangers, so it doesn’t seem like the inference that because they were partnered the sex was consensual is very strong, at least in cases where sexual assault is asserted.

Can you point to these sources? “Acquaintances” is certainly very believable; “partners” seems rather unlikely. And if it turns out to be true I’d certainly like to know it!

[jb]

Sure. RAINN says it’s 33% current or former partners vs 20% strangers:

https://www.rainn.org/statistics/perpetrators-sexual-violence

A USDOJ study cited here says 28% partners vs 27% strangers:

https://www.new-hope.org/perpetrators-of-sexual-violence/

I can’t put more than two links but there are other studies with different methodologies that have the number of partners vs strangers about equal as well.

[TwelveInchPianist]

“Most sources seem to agree that at least as many women are raped by partners than strangers,”

Perhaps, but they’re also much much more likely to consent to sex with partners that with strangers.

[Nige]

Previous consent has nothing to do with whether a current sexual assault occurred.

[jb]

Yes, but they don't call it rape when they're doing that.

The question is whether it's more credible for someone claiming to have been raped when they're saying a stranger did it versus their partner. As you and most others on this thread are demonstrating, there's a pretty strong supposition that it's less likely to be true if the alleged rapist was a partner, but then you look at the actual data and it's not clear that that's true at all. So I can see why someone looking to reduce unhelpful bias might want to remove this sort of evidence from discussion, and I'm more persuaded now than I was yesterday after having looked into it and seen the reactions here.

[TwelveInchPianist]

"It’s not hard to come up with bad scenarios if the info is automatically excluded..."

That's even true about evidence of what the victim was wearing.

For example, if a man is accused of raping a female plumber who showed up to fix his toilet, I would be very skeptical of a consent defense. If she showed up for the plumbing call wearing a teddy, I would be much less skeptical.

[David Nieporent]

If she showed up for the plumbing call wearing a teddy, I would be much less skeptical.

You've seen that video too, huh?

[TwelveInchPianist]

lol.

[Longtobefree]

"The truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth".

Except when we say different.

[not guilty]

“Colorado passed a law preventing sexual assault defendants from introducing evidence of prior sexual contact with the defendant. Seems like that would be pretty important for a jury to know.”

Since TwelveInchPianist didn’t see fit to link to the text of the bill, I will do so here. https://leg.colorado.gov/sites/default/files/2024a_1072_signed.pdf

The bill doesn’t prevent sexual assault defendants under all circumstances from introducing evidence of a complainant's prior sexual contact with the defendant.

Is anyone else unsurprised?

[TwelveInchPianist]

I linked to a news report about the law. Looking at your link, the article seems to get it right. Perhaps you can explain why you think the article was wrong?

[not guilty]

Did you read the bill before characterizing it as "a law preventing sexual assault defendants from introducing evidence of prior sexual contact with the defendant"? Yes or no? My quarrel is with your description moreso than with the content of the article you linked to.

The bill provides a framework for determining when evidence of a complainant's prior sexual conduct is or is not admissible. It creates a rebuttable presumption of inadmissibility, subject to constitutional limitations, and prescribes procedures by which that presumption may be rebutted.

Such constitutional limitations can include the accused's due process rights to confrontation and cross-examination and the right to present a defense. These due process rights have been held to "trump" a number of other state and federal rules of procedure and evidence, including rape shield statutes. See, State v. Brown, 29 S.W.3d 427, 433 (Tenn. 2000), and cases collected at fn.12 thereof.

There is no substitute for original source materials.

[TwelveInchPianist]

All rape shield laws do that, and are typically summarized as laws preventing the defense from bringing up the alleged victim’s sexual history. What this law did was remove the exception for history between the accuser and the accused, which will almost be relevant. It’s possible that in practice this law will have no effect, but that certainly wasn’t the intent.

[Ed Grinberg]

Apparently Colorado legislators want to make sexual intercourse a “strict liability” activity (like blasting), except that instead of being (civilly) liable for any physical damage (whether foreseeable or not), one is (criminally) liable if the woman changes her mind the next morning (or weeks or months (years?) down the road). Awesome!

[Noscitur a sociis]

What, pray tell, the fuck are you talking about?

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

THE VOLOKH CONSPIRACY

This white, male, conservative blog
with a thin, receding academic veneer
— dedicated to creating and defending
safe spaces for America’s vestigial
bigots -- has operated for no more than

ZERO (0)

days (not a one) without publishing
at least one racial slur; it has
published racial slurs on at least

TWENTY-THREE (23)

occasions (so far) during the
first four months of 2024
(that’s at least 23 exchanges
that have included a racial slur,
not just 23 racial slurs; many
Volokh Conspiracy discussions
feature multiple racial slurs.)

This blog is outrunning its
remarkable pace of 2023,
when the Volokh Conspiracy
published racial slurs in at least

FORTY-FOUR (44)

different discussions.

These numbers likely miss
some of the racial slurs this
blog regularly publishes; it
would be unreasonable to expect
anyone to catch all of them.

This assessment does not address
the broader, everyday stream of
antisemitic, gay-bashing, misogynistic,
immigrant-hating, Palestinian-hating,
transphobic, Islamophobic, racist,
and other bigoted content published
at this faux libertarian blog, which
is presented from the disaffected,
disrespected right-wing fringe of
legal academia by members of
the Federalist Society for Law
and Public Policy Studies.

Amid this stale and ugly thinking, here is something worthwhile.

For '80s MTV fans, another version

[TwelveInchPianist]

Remember the time you quoted EV using the term "nigger" in order to criticize him for quoting someone using the term "nigger"? That was hilarious.

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

Remember all the times better Americans have imposed their better preferences on ignorant, bigoted, superstitious right-wingers? That's how you guys came to be disaffected culture war casualties, and it was delicious! Every time! I still enjoy watching conservatives get smacked around by their betters and by reality (Catholic schools closing; backwater towns shuttering police departments; another church rejecting gay-bashing; another day of America becoming less rural, less religious, less bigoted, less backward, and more diverse; mainstream schools collecting keys from and terminating computer access of conservative professors; etc.)

How important a factor was Prof. Volokh's habitual use of vile racial slurs (or his lathering of right-wing bigots at his white, male, bigoted blog) in his imminent departure from UCLA's campus, in your judgment?

[TwelveInchPianist]

No, but I remember when you kept dropping n-bombs.

[Bwaaah]

Was that before the Rev started publishing stats on the use of "vile racial slurs?"

Look how easy it is to trigger all that same old same-old from Resentful Arthur by just posting one little historical fact about him. But I note that he didn't use the term "clinger" once, not here nor in any other comment on this page so far. It appears that he's trying to rehabilitate his hateful image. (lol)

"Clinger" is Resentful Arthur's n-word to denote the sub-humanity of all the people he hates. Why limit oneself to a vile racial slur when one can escalate to a more generalized vile slur, and dehumanize even more people.

Resentful Arthur: teaching us about humanity. (With a skull that thick, where does the brain fit?)

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

.

Why limit oneself to a vile racial slur when one can escalate to a more generalized vile slur

The bigotry presented by the Volokh Conspiracy is multihued.

Gay-bashing is frequent.

Misogyny is commonplace.

Antisemitism is a regular feature, as is Islamophobia.

Racism is everpresent. White nationalists and white supremacists are at home at the Volokh Conspiracy. The tone with respect to racial slurs has been established, vividly, by the proprietor.

Xenophobia is among this blog's most prominent features.

Christian dominionism is a standard element of this blog's palette.

No wonder clingers love this blog. They are its target audience.

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

Today's moments of Rolling Stones bliss:

First, for the person who wondered about Mick's voice, a revelation (a bit of hillbilly mockery never hurts).

Next, a demonstration of what country music could be (if it weren't practiced mostly by hillbillies).

Enjoy -- especially if you are headed to New Orleans (I'm still considering it).

[ThePublius]

Arthur, I like the Stones, but there's no need to denigrate the so-called "hillbillies" of country music. I'm sure the Stones owe more to their legacy than the reverse.

Is Elvis a hillbilly? Dolly Parton? Willie Nelson? Loretta Lynn? Johnny Cash? Merle Haggard? Even going back to the creator of country swing, Bob Wills? 🙂

[WuzYoungOnceToo]

Arthur, I like the Stones, but there’s no need to denigrate the so-called “hillbillies” of country music. I’m sure the Stones owe more to their legacy than the reverse.

Hell, one of my favorite Stones tracks is Far Away Eyes because I always assumed (perhaps erroneously) that it was something of an homage to some of the country music that inspired them.

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

Watch the official video (and consider the lyrics) for insight concerning the band's reverence for country music and its fans.

I can't find the article, but I recall one of the music publications asking Keith about Far Away Eyes being played on country stations, Keith expressing surprise, and a response along the line of 'some people don't get it when the joke is on them.'

It is a masterful track, from the drawled lyrics and pedal steel to laconic perfection from Bill and Charlie.

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

From my perspective, there is nothing wrong with enjoying a good parody or two, even though you can't really take country music seriously (Mick also used "tongue-in-cheek" occasionally to describe the Stones' country excursions).

Other great examples: Do You Really Think I Care (Some Girls outtake), Through the Lonely Nights (Goats Head Soup b-lister), No Spare Parts (Some Girls outtake), Sweet Virginia

A compilation of the Stones' country work -- the top dozen or so -- might be the best country album ever produced.

[Stella Link the dog]

Ragging on country music may be cheap fun, but there's a lot of seriously good music that gets put into the CM category. Consider John Prine, Jason Isbell, Molly Tuttle, Guy Clark, Sierra Hull, JJ Cale, Alison Krauss, and many others. It's not all Garth and Cyrus and Swift.

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

There is probably (maybe?) some good gas station sushi somewhere in America, too, but . . .

[Stella Link the dog]

Where would The Band have been without Robbie Robertson and Levon Helm? Where would Dylan have been without The Band (probably Mobile)? What would Clapton have done without JJ Cale? What would the Wrecking Crew have been without Leon Russell? Hillbillies, everywhere I look, there's a hillbilly.

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

I loved the Band. I once saw them stop during mid-concert, for a minute without much fuss, while most or maybe all of them switched instruments, then resumed without missing a beat. That was the reason I played three instruments -- and encouraged my mates to switch instruments, too -- during damned near every show I played for decades.

I do not consider the Band -- which began with Ronnie Hawkins (who started as a hayseed but became a rocker after joining a Black R&B band) and backed Dylan -- a country act. Not nearly.

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

How many of those performers are alive?

Today, country music is made by and for disaffected, downscale, white, rural bigots for whom pickup trucks and cowboy hats are silly affectations and education is something to be avoided.

Hillbillies. Hayseeds. Rednecks. Losers. Yokels. Dumbasses.

Country music probably could have avoided being what it is. But it didn't. Drawling, twanging, downscale, jingoistic rubbish mostly copied from better forms.

[Frank Drackman]

how do you know if you don’t listen to it?
and “That Mexican OT” is as Country as you can get, and doesn’t fit into any of your neat files you put people into

Frank

[Brett Bellmore]

"Dolly Parton?"

Sheesh. I've seen the shack she grew up in, if she doesn't qualify as having been a hillbilly, we might as well retire the word, it's got no application.

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

.

I’m sure the Stones owe more to their legacy than the reverse.

That is intensely unpersuasive. Most popular country music these days is a flimsy facsimile of rock (same with popular Christian music). And I have never heard anyone contend, even in jest, that Jumpin' Jack Flash, Satisfaction, Midnight Rambler, Brown Sugar, Starfucker, You Can't Always Get What You Want, It's Only Rock 'n' Roll, Get Off Of My Cloud, Paint It Black, Sympathy for the Devil, or or a hundred others owed much to country music. When the Stones took a trip through the country, it was (magnificent) parody.

[Krayt]

I wonder what the British Invasion would have been like without Liverpudlians, or even Brits.

[Frank Drackman]

Your "Hillbilly" Accent is just an English one with a few hundred years of Evil-lution

[Krayt]

That occurred to me two decades ago. "Standard national newscaster" American English, as counterpoint, is the result of heavy German speaker accent modification.

[ThePublius]

Pi Kappa Phi Men Defended their Flag. Throw 'em a Rager
https://www.gofundme.com/f/pi-kappa-phi-men-defended-their-flag-throw-em-a-rager

"Commie losers across the country have invaded college campuses to make dumb demands of weak University Administrators.

But amidst the chaos, the screaming, the anti-semitism, the hatred of faith and flag, stood a platoon of American heroes. Armored in Vineyard Vines and Patagonia, fueled by Zyn and White Claws, these triumphant Brohemians protected Old Glory from the unwashed Marxist horde -- laughing at their shrieks and wails and shielding the Stars & Stripes from Soviet missiles.

These boys... no, men, of the UNC Chapel Hill Pi Kappa Phi, gave the best to America and now they deserve the best.

Help us raise funds to throw this frat the party they deserve, a party worth of the boat-shoed Broleteriat who did their country proud."

[loki13]

Frats gonna frat!

Since I have previously said that college students gonna be college students (idealism unleavened by experience), I will also say, in response to this post, that college students gonna be college students.

Which is to say, try to find ways to get other people to pay for their beer.

[Commenter_XY]

Idealism unleavened by experience...

That is a good one. I am going to use it. I promise to give you attribution.

[Bwaaah]

I just read it, and was going to write the same before I saw that you already did it.

"Idealism, unleavened by experience."

How beautifully deflating is that? (Just like real life.)

[ReaderY]

I’m not saying fraternity people are saints.

But as Winston Churchill put it, if Hitler invaded Hell, I’d be willing to make at least a favorable mention of the Devil in the House of Commons.

[Bwaaah]

"idealism unleavened by experience"

Just thinking of my youthful days as a big fat challah, slowly reduced by experience to the more modest piece of matzah that I am now.

Just having fun with it. Your terse phrase was a beautiful one there.

[WuzYoungOnceToo]

fueled by Zyn and White Claws

These boys… no, men

We have an internal consistency problem here.

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

Southern fraternities have a lot to be proud of . . . among obsolete bigots and half-educated, drawling losers of America's culture war.

[The Margrave of Azilia]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DRQWP-TL4gk

[Frank Drackman]

they do actually, which is why they wouldn't let me in one

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

Have you not claimed to be Jewish?

And you are not clear about why a southern fraternity wouldn't take you?

[Frank Drackman]

Well the Black one wouldn't because I didn't have the required rhythm. I'm 1/2 Jewish (Mom, the good 1/2) so got an Irish name, and we don't all look like Larry David, so pretty sure that wasn't why they wouldn't have me in one. Also didn't have the Sheckels for the dues, and hate Polos and Penny Loafers.

Frank

[Bwaaah]

The Penny Loafer was my dress shoe. It was much easier to put a dime into it than a penny. And then you were always prepared to make a phone call. And just when your time would run out, you had the other shoe.

[ReaderY]

Again, I’m not going to claim these people are saints. But as Winston Churchill put it about his not-exactly-saintly allies, if Hitler invaded Hell, I’d be willing to make at least a favorable mention of the Devil in the House of Commons.

[loki13]

Random thought.

I just read the article on Vox on fighting deepfake nudes.

https://www.vox.com/24145522/ai-deepfake-apps-teens-ban-laws

This has been a major topic recently in a number of areas. From the Taylor Swift on Twitter/X issue, to the unfortunately common, and increasing, use of the technology by high school students. I personally think that using this on people to shame them, to humiliate them, and to harm them is reprehensible. No one should do that, and no one should be subjected to that. I can’t imagine a teen girl* (or, god forbid, younger) having that happen to them.

*Or boy. But it seems to be almost exclusively targeted at women.

That said, I read the entire article, and I didn’t see a single mention of Ashcroft v. Free Speech Coalition, 535 US 234 (2002). That case stood for the proposition that computer-generated child p**n can’t be criminalized under the First Amendment. Has anyone been attempting to look at how this deluge of deepfakes, and purported legislation against them, comports with this case, and with the First Amendment?

[Josh R]

Just off the top of my head, there is a fraudulent aspect with a specific victim to deepfake nudes that distinguish them from computer-generated child porn (Ashcroft relied in part of the absence of victims).

And I have to ask, why do you think the word "porn" is so offensive it justifies hiding it with asterisks?

[loki13]

"And I have to ask, why do you think the word “porn” is so offensive it justifies hiding it with asterisks?"

Habit. That's a term that tends to make a lot of comment filters get all crazy, so I just always default to doing that when commenting.

I don't actually think the term is offensive per se, just don't want to get booted as if I was a spambot.

[Krayt]

It's the same reason someone conjured into existence "pr0n" on slashdot decades ago.

[loki13]

As to your substantive response, I think that this is a distinction a court can make. But the reasoning was more grounded in the idea that these laws are permissible in that the "speech" is a recordation of actual instances of child abuse.

The Court rejected the idea that some potential for future acts or harm would be a sufficient reason to violate the FA (for the virtual images).

Based on the reasoning, unless overturned or really distinguished, it would seem that the idea that these might (and, honestly, often are) used for future harm or might cause dignitary harm would be insufficient to ban them under the FA. Maybe you could allow a defamation-type suit against the person who made them, but I'm curious to see how courts will treat this.

[Josh R]

Yes, a defamation-type lawsuit might be necessary. Or perhaps not, where instead the prosecution would have to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that harm was caused (no reliance on future harm, but would dignitary harm suffice).

[loki13]

Agreed. I appreciate your thoughts. I don't have any firm convictions on how this would play out legally, and I think that the use of deepfake nudes to harass and intimidate people is horrible, I just don't understand why there hasn't been any mention of Ashcroft, and I was wondering if anyone else had some ideas about that.

Given that there was a SCOTUS case on virtual images, it seems that it might be relevant.

[Commenter_XY]

Was CJ Rehnquist right in his dissent in Ashcroft? My understanding is he made the point that modern technology would make the virtual images indistinguishable from real images (sort of like using AI to generate images?).

I remember this case vaguely at the time.

[Noscitur a sociis]

That case stood for the proposition that computer-generated child p**n can’t be criminalized under the First Amendment.

No, it says that computer generated images of fictitious minors can’t be banned, nor can representing adults as minors. The federal ban still applies to a “visual depiction has been created, adapted, or modified to appear that an identifiable minor is engaging in sexually explicit conduct.” That part wasn’t challenged in Ashcroft, and as far as I know every court of appeals to consider it has held its constitutional. So a deepfake nude of a minor is already illegal (under federal law), and I don’t see why an appropriately-crafted statute couldn’t reach adult victims too.

[Bored Lawyer]

I agree it's likely Constitutional, but the reasoning is a bit different, I think. Child-porn has been held not protected because it leads to exploitation of children.

Deep-fake nudes, as I understand the term, refers to taking a pictured of a clothed person (child or adult) and altering it to make the person look nude. That does not have the same issues as child porn. It's more like a false-light/defamation issue. Which I still think can Consitutionally be banned or controlled, but not for the same reason.

Difference might be, for example, whether a republisher would have the defenses from NY Times v. Sullivan and its progeny. Meaning, one person alters the pick, and then someone else, believing it to be real, publishes it. ("Donald Trump posed nude as a teenager, we have the pics.") Do you have to show actual malice?

[Krayt]

For adults, anyway, I can’t see making racy or nude paintings of real (adult) people (especially Hollywood) illegal, ergo computer generated ones. Photorealistic + claims it’s real might run into trouble though, but that should remain in the realm of liability for fraud, not a crack opening censorship up a tad.

I recall Chicago seizing a rude painting of the (male) mayor in lingerie, claiming a heckler’s veto because there might be violence. Civil libertarians had a tizzy. I have no idea the outcome, but it probably wasn’t good for the censors.

[loki13]

Noscitur,

Thank you for the pointer. I had forgotten about that (the "morphing" issue that the court declined to address). That seems to be in 18 USC sec. 2252A(c)(2) (providing that not using an actual minor is an affirmative defense, but cross referencing 18 USC 2256 (8)(C) and noting that it cannot be an affirmative defense if the depiction was created, adapted, or modified to appear as an identifiable minor).

As I wrote, I am just thinking through the issues here given the article I read.

That may (depending on the circumstances and court at the time) be sufficient for the issues arising with high schools, but does not resolve the other issues.

[The Margrave of Azilia]

The protesters hauled down the U. S. flag and put up the Palestinian flag on the main flagpole on campus.

The interim Chancellor, accompanied by cops, charged in and put Old Glory back up.

After the cops withdrew, it was up the the frat boys to defend the national ensign as the protesters tried to take it down again.

The idea of a frat party seems trollish, but trollish as it is, it raised almost $400,000 so far.

The interim chancellor will presumably soon be replaced with a more conventionally weak-kneed permanent chancellor. The fact that this leaves the frats to be the forces of law an order says nothing bad about the frats, it says something about administrators who delegate to frats the enforcement of clear college policies.

[tylertusta]

The protesters hauled down the U. S. flag and put up the Palestinian flag on the main flagpole on campus.

... The interim chancellor will presumably soon be replaced with a more conventionally weak-kneed permanent chancellor

If this is the kind of “rule of law” that our overlords in the lawyerly class screeches on about daily, then they’re about to get an education on governance and what happens to a vacuum of power.

[Bwaaah]

"If this is the kind of “rule of law” that our overlords in the lawyerly class screeches on about daily, then they’re about to get an education on governance and what happens to a vacuum of power."

Indeed, policing tends to be a relatively restrained alternative to self-defense. Pacifists simultaneously attack policing while imploring people to stand down and wait for it. Witness the vacuum they create. Feel the angry winds starting to rush into their "safe" space.

[Nige]

'The idea of a frat party seems trollish, but trollish as it is, it raised almost $400,000 so far. '

You can never go far wrong grifting the right.

[The Margrave of Azilia]

Well, it seems it wasn't the actual fraternity, per se, raising the money.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/other/unc-fraternity-says-it-s-not-involved-in-viral-fundraiser-for-rager-for-defending-american-flag/ar-AA1o3a0H

I rushed to believe the media, so much the worse for me. Now the fraternity people will be discussed in the context of this stunt they don't seem to be involved in.

The bottom line remains - that one side wants to lower the U. S. flag, the other to raise it. Discuss anything but that!

[Nige]

Someone still seems to be grifting. The flag thing seems to have served its purpose in making someone a few quick bucks from the outraged right.

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

These wingnuts will never stop falling for these scams, it seems, until replacement occurs.

I am just grateful my children and grandchildren will get to compete economically with the MAGA-QAnon-Trump fans.

[Ed Grinberg]

.

one side wants to lower the U. S. flag, the other to raise it.

Like I said above: "unassimilable foreigners whose native cultures / beliefs are incompatible with ours."

[The Margrave of Azilia]

You're not helping.

One of the students who protected the flag was named Guillermo Estrada.

[Malika the Maiz]

Cultures and beliefs change. At one time the idea that Japanese or German Americans could assimilate would have been seriously doubted.

[Bob from Ohio]

"Japanese"?

Bunch of xenophobes!

"Why? Because we welcome immigrants," he added. "Think about it. Why is China stalling so badly economically? Why is Japan having trouble. Why is Russia? Why is India? Because they're xenophobic. They don't want immigrants." Joe Biden, winning friends and influencing people

[Sarcastr0]

Bob missed the Americans in the 'Japanese or German Americans' and so went off about other nation's policy to people who are American citizens.

Oops!

[Mr. Bumble]

Not much about Miss Fanny lately so I pass this along for what it’s worth:

https://thefederalist.com/2024/05/02/did-fani-willis-indict-the-fulton-19-defendants-without-proper-jurisdiction/

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

Jiving Sister Fanny

or take two

[Frank Drackman]

Was great when Keisha "Big" Bottoms was Atlanta Mayor, we had a Fanny, and a Bottoms.
Now we've got Andre Dickens, who's actually done a pretty good job, giving the Homeless the Bum's Rush from the Airport, he's still a DemoKKKrat, but ended the Mask mandate before most big cities did, and supports Israel, and yes, I'm going to marry him, just showing I don't automatically hate all DemoKKKrats.

Frank

[Sarcastr0]

I'm into country music. Inherited trait from my wife.

I like Tom T Hall and Randy Travis especially.

My favorite band is still Simon and Garfunkel though.

[Bob from Ohio]

"Inherited trait from my wife. "

You are married to your Mom? Otherwise that is not how inheritance works.

[Brett Bellmore]

It's not how genetic inheritance works.

[ThePublius]

I like Simon and Garfunkel, too, but I wouldn't call them a "band." 🙂

I like almost all kinds of music. I'm into stride piano and jazz lately.

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

I have never heard of stride piano. Was Jerry Lee Lewis involved?

[not guilty]

I haven't googled it, but I have heard stride piano associated with Fats Waller.

[Paladin_44]

See (and hear) also Judy Carmichael (https://www.judycarmichael.com/)

[Sarcastr0]

Some deeper S&G cuts I like:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=diNi6F4usCM
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=raaQXN91PHs

[Commenter_XY]

I was always partial to Cecelia, and Kodachrome.

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

First album I bought (from a discount bin; I didn't know much about it but the price was right) was Wednesday Morning 3 A.M., which featured this on Simon & Garfunkel's first side.

First single was this one, with Peter Cetera handling vocals and Terry Kath standing out among giants.

[Alpheus W Drinkwater]

The criminally underrated Terry Kath. Great vocalist too.

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

Some are limited by ability to devise. Others are limited by ability to implement. Kath had two exceptionally high ceilings.

[NEOrionFifty]

In retrospect, Terry Kath was Chicago. They were never the same.

Criminally underrated band these days that are too identified with their 80s soft rock period.

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

Terry Kath was magnificent, but discounting Robert Lamm, Peter Cetera, and the horn section seems far wrong.

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

I had a CD of Stones country songs on regular rotation in the car for many years. My band played one of those tunes at most shows for years. I wouldn't listen to most of the rest of that shit with your ears.

[Frank Drackman]

Listened to “Rumours” the other day, straight through, like you were supposed to with an Album, yeah, Fleetwood Mac, I’m secure enough in my Masculinity to admit it instead of acting cool because I like the Stones (who doesn’t like the Stones?) and I liked them better with Buckingham/Nicks than whoever they had before, and I’m not alone, you know who else likes Fleetwood Mac? “Slash”, Kid Rock, Axl Rose, and the late Kurt Cobain.

Frank “Where’s my Carpenters Album??????”

[Sarcastr0]

They call Tom T Hall The Storyteller. The lyrics what you sign up for.

This is a pretty great ramble with a bit of depth if you're looking for it:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jQHLD5Vvpzo

[Stella Link the dog]

Have you listened to any of Jason Isbell's music?

[Sarcastr0]

Not yet, but I have some woodshedding to do right now for work so good time for it!

[Frank Drackman]

So what happened to Hunter's Gun Charges?
That's a crime people actually go to Federal-Pound-Me-in-the-Ass Prison for.

Frank

[David Nieporent]

Lying on the form is virtually never prosecuted unless part of a bigger offense. (Such as straw purchases.)

[Stella Link the dog]

"Lying on the form is virtually never prosecuted "
The one case often brought up is a straw purchase in, as I recall, New Jersey for the real purchaser in PA. Hooker is that the miscreant in that case didn't get a custodial sentence -- pretty much the same result that HB would have gotten with his plea deal.

[Brett Bellmore]

It's extremely hard to prove straw purchases. The fact that somebody buys a gun and immediately gives it to somebody else isn't enough, since you ARE legally entitled to sell guns, or give them as gifts. Heck, you can even walk into the store with the recipient of the gift, and have them pick it out.

And you can buy a gun, change your mind, and turn around and sell it to somebody else right away.

They have to prove that it's actually the other person buying the gun, and you're just signing the form in their place, very hard to do.

[Frank Drackman]

Hmmm, sort of like the Bullshit "45"'s been charged with

[Martinned2]

This may be ill-advised (and contrary to the Spanish constitution and/or European human rights law):

Pedro Sánchez is threatening to tighten control of the media, blaming news reports for prompting a judge to open a criminal investigation into his wife’s finances.

The Spanish prime minister said that the opening of the case against Begoña Gómez, who was alleged to have used her position to peddle influence, has led him to crack down on a right-wing “mud machine”. He added that the move was part of what he called “democratic regeneration”.

Sánchez said in a radio interview on Tuesday that he wants to tackle websites and digital pages, which he referred to as “pseudomedia” that “affects all democracies”.

https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/pedro-sanchez-curbs-media-spain-begona-gomez-corruption-claims-fvb7nltcn

[Frank Drackman]

The Prime Minister of Spain is Pedro Sanchez??
Did he ask voters to "Vote for Pedro"? did he tell them all of their wildest dreams would come true if they voted for him? Did Pedro offer the voters Pedro's protection? Did the chickens have large Talons?

Frank

[BrotherMovesOn]

He has skills!

[Estragon]

90 arrested at Dartmouth last night. More cops than homecoming! Fortunately hanover is out of range of Ed’s snowplow. Was Zywicki on the front lines??

https://www.thedartmouth.com/article/2024/05/campus-encampments-live-updates-police-start-taking-students-away

Storied commitment to free speech a mile wide and an inch deep… news at 11.

What does noted felon and Dartmouth grad Dnesh have to say? Anyone know?

[The Margrave of Azilia]

Could you review the free-speech violations here?

[Estragon]

“violations”

Your word, not mine

[The Margrave of Azilia]

Then perhaps I misunderstood your meaning?

[Estragon]

Probably

[Bwaaah]

No free-speech violations. He buried the just cause within his "inch-deep" metaphor. At least he's honest enough to avoid defending the indefensible, despite his sympathies.

The most disturbing abuse by the police was captured in the article:

Officers could be heard saying “it’s past your bedtime” and “it’s time to go home,”

How is *that* not a speech violation?

[Estragon]

“the just cause”

Ipse dixit. I could draw contrasts with previous situations or point out that the administration is actually doing what conservatives want done but nuance isn’t really being engaged with these days.

[Commenter_XY]

I understand Dartmouth was the inspiration for the movie Animal House. How appropriate. Human animals now run Dartmouth.

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

Do you recognize that you are disaffected?

[Estragon]

Animals run Dartmouth?

They’re doing what you want! Heavy handed police presence, arrests (with protestors taken to jail in college-owned vehicles)— heck, they even broke some guys shoulder just cause he was walking home and in the general area.

Again, I could draw contrasts with previous situations— at Dartmouth!— but of course nuance isn’t really the style around here these days.

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

I endorse the decision to reject reactivation of the law license of un-American stain John Eastman.

Although this public protection measure will require other stains (such as Marjorie Taylor Greene and Matt Gaetz) to look elsewhere for legal representation, it also will protect those half-wits from themselves and perhaps arrange professional legal assistance for them.

(This probably doesn't necessarily keep Eastman entirely out of the law-talking guy business; maybe he can speak for himself with respect to his latest indictment, in Arizona.)

[Frank Drackman]

Revolting Arthur certainly knows his Stains.

[Estragon]

Turns out Aileen Cannon failed to disclose two junkets to Montana sponsored by… George Mason! I’ll now ask the burning question I’m sure everyone is wondering… was Bernstein there???

https://www.npr.org/2024/05/01/1247512187/federal-judges-disclosures-luxury-trips

[Bob from Ohio]

Big picture of Cannon, smaller pic of Bush appointee and no pic of Judge Leslie Gardner.

No bias there!

To be fair, based on her sister, may not have been any room for her pic.

[Estragon]

“may not have been any room”

Bob providing yet more evidence that one can always go lower!

[mydisplayname]

Still amused that university student protesters agree on one thing: https://twitter.com/MavenNavarro1/status/1785785576571994299

[Frank Drackman]

So who remembers what song the Stones were playing when that kid got stabbed at Altamont?
No, it wasn’t ” Gimme Shelter”

Frank

[JesusHadBlondeHairBlueEyes]

Just like in 1776, the Chad's are going to save America from the Democrat Marxists.

https://twitter.com/EndWokeness/status/1786119117000298652

[Nige]

Except the ones who were caught by the British, they were hanging Chads.

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

I guess it is interesting to see a bunch of conservative Mississippi rednecks set aside their profound hatred of Jews (or Blacks, or gays, etc,) for a moment for any reason.

[JesusHadBlondeHairBlueEyes]

All jokes aside,

OMG/O'Keefe dropped ANOTHER bombshell today. Earlier it was the CIA and their coup/treason against POTUS Trump.

This time, he's gone undercover in an FBI sting. It's just as eye-opening.

https://twitter.com/Rapidsloth_/status/1785975973319520272

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

James O'Keefe is a multifaceted person who seemingly just wants to live his dream -- and I would pay to watch James O'Keefe and Eugene Volokh discuss transgender issues.

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

Sounds like a bad one for Donald Trump in court today.

His attorney tried to downplay a Trump role in the payoff negotiations and arrangements, but a recording played in court indicated Trump had (1) consulted about "how to set this whole thing up with funding," (2) asked "What do to we got to pay for this thing? One-fifty?" and (3) expressly suggested that the payment be made in cash.

Trump was reported to be intensely agitated when prosecutors played the recording for jurors, said to be straining noticeably against some urge.

What urge?

To claim the recording was fake?

To demand that someone of his station not be subjected to this truth and indignity?

To provide his side of the story?

(Can anyone explain why the nondisclosure (settlement) agreement would employ pseudonyms for Trump (David Dennison) and Daniels (Peggy Petersen) and be accompanied by a "side agreement" containing this provision: “It is understood and agreed that the true name and identity of the person referred to as ‘DAVID DENNISON’ in the Settlement Agreement is Donald Trump”?)

It was reported that Melania Trump was not at her husband's side today as jurors learned details of a scheme to conceal payments for silence to the women Trump was cheating with while Melania was caring for the Trumps' infant son.

[JesusHadBlondeHairBlueEyes]

Which of those are crimes?

[Frank Drackman]

None of them, but don’t stop the “Reverend” he’s Revolting

[Estragon]

Flatulent low-energy Don Snorelone said today he won’t testify in his own defense as promised because of the gag order! It’s an outrage that Don is being prevented from testifying in his own defense!! How can a gag order overcome this sacred constitutional right? This Judge is making a traveshamockery of Justice! UNFAIR!

[apedad]

Trump, during a break from the proceedings Thursday, pushed back against reports that he had dozed off in court multiple times during the trial.

“Contrary to the FAKE NEWS MEDIA, I don’t fall asleep during the Crooked D.A.’s Witch Hunt, especially not today,” Trump posted on Truth Social. “I simply close my beautiful blue eyes, sometimes, listen intensely, and take it ALL in!!!”

~~~~
Christ, Trump's got the mental level of a 15-year old boy in high school.

[BrotherMovesOn]

The great Tom Wolfe's novel A Man in Full comes to the screen today after 25 years.
Differing from the novel in unexpected details, but off to a rollicking good start! Netflix

[mydisplayname]

Naw, you dont's. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x9nmSJ3gesE

[mydisplayname]

Oh, so long ago: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xlCilKlqrvI

[Martinned2]

In Stockport they just elected Karl Marx to the Borough Council: https://twitter.com/StockportMBC/status/1786219698415136860

[NvEric]

Another F.B.I. scam -> see here:
https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1786041225499320539.html
Many more are still being flushed out, and the People will welcome anyone inside the F.B.I. to come forward and tell the truth of ALL activities.

[apedad]

What's happening in Tennessippi recently?

‘Literally about to get killed right there’: Pizza delivery driver shot at 7 times after parking in the wrong driveway, police say

The driver, 18-year-old Caiden Wheeler, told Nashville CBS affiliate WTVF he made the delivery to a house on North Poole Street in Ashland City around 8 p.m. Wheeler told the outlet he accidentally parked in the wrong driveway, delivered the pizza to the correct house and got back into the truck. That’s when (Ryan S.) Babcock allegedly ran at him and opened up fire. Three of the seven bullets hit Wheeler’s truck, the affidavit said.

Babcock allegedly told cops he saw a truck in his driveway on his Ring camera and thought someone was trying to break into his vehicle. Babcock said he grabbed his 9 mm handgun, ran outside and began shooting in order to disable the truck, the affidavit said.

https://lawandcrime.com/crime/literally-about-to-get-killed-right-there-pizza-delivery-driver-shot-at-7-times-after-parking-in-the-wrong-driveway-police-say/

Stay classy, Tennessippi!

[NOVA Lawyer]

Babcock should be convicted of enough to make it illegal for him to own firearms. Shoot first and ask questions later is, I'm pretty sure, not yet enshrined in Tennessippi law.

He's currently charged with aggravated assault. They shouldn't plead down. Looks like a Class C or D felony.

No more guns for Babcock, hopefully.

https://fugitive.com/ryan-babcock-arrested-for-allegedly-shooting-7-shots-at-pizza-delivery-driver/

[Bwaaah]

What's the penalty for attempting to kill a truck?

[NOVA Lawyer]

Probably in the range of 2-15 years in Tennessee, it appears.

Seems about right given the level of stupidity with a gun and the recklessness with regard to the life of the driver of the truck.

[M L]

Biden announced $6.1 billion in student loan forgiveness for huge numbers of people who attended "The Art Institute" which was apparently a huge organization with locations in different states, apparently because the students got scammed.

Anyone know how much of that $6.1 billion the government will be recovering against the scam artists, organization, the administrators, the professors etc?

Or will the government just be taking $6.1 billion from hardworking taxpayers and giving it to this select group of scam victims?

[NOVA Lawyer]

The Art Institues. Any affiliation with Trump University? Other than, obviously, also being a scam education program to defraud people?

Did they get all their money back from the fraudster who....checking notes....currently claims to be a billionaire and is running for president?

[Bwaaah]

Ooo. Look at choo crawlin’ along the bottom there, shakin’ your tail, hopin’ somebody’s lookin’ for some desert. Six hours at it and no bites yet?

Those still look to me like some tasty turds on your hook there, babe. I just don’t like goin’ that far down, to feed.

Good luck with that.