Wednesday Open Thread

What's on your mind?

Comments

[Kazinski]

ItS about time:

“The Trump administration plans to send its first spending cuts request to Congress on Tuesday, asking lawmakers to swiftly eliminate $9.4 billion in funding for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting and various foreign aid programs.”

9.4 billion isn’t enough, but more is coming:

The proposal is the first of several that will seek to codify efforts undertaken by U.S. DOGE Service and billionaire Elon Musk before he left his official role as a special government employee.

GOP leaders in Congress appear likely to hold floor votes on the request, which only needs a simple majority to pass the Senate, avoiding the need for Democratic support to get past the 60-vote legislative filibuster.”
https://www.govexec.com/management/2025/06/trump-wants-congress-slash-94b-spending-now-defund-npr-and-pbs/405772/

[Martinned]

Sure, who needs impartial public broadcasting anyway? Why would anyone think that the polarisation of news and information has been bad for the US?

[Brett Bellmore]

Impartial public broadcasting might be interesting to have. We haven’t had that in the US for a very long time.

What we’ve had is public broadcasting which is reliably aligned with a particular political party, regardless of who wins elections.

You know what’s worse than polarized news and information? News and information which isn’t polarized because it’s uniformly from one particular perspective, and opposing viewpoints are just shut out.

Seriously, this is a persistent problem here in the US, that the Democratic party has captured the bureaucracy, including public broadcasting, and it operates to advance the interests of the Democratic party even when the voters have given Republicans nominal control of the government.

You couldn’t expect Republicans to tolerate that situation in perpetuity.

[Martinned]

…and so we’re back to you not being able to tell the difference between someone who disagrees with you and someone who isn’t impartial.

[Michael P]

If you can tell whether a reporter agrees with you, that’s a good sign they are in fact partial, at least on that topic.

[Martinned]

There are topics where a reporter is supposed to have a view. Impartiality is not the same as “opinions vary about the shape of the earth”.

[Michael P]

It sounds like you have the problem that you attributed to Brett.

[bye]

Depends…most reportters have the same views.

[bernard11]

If you can tell whether a reporter agrees with you, that’s a good sign they are in fact partial, at least on that topic.

Nonsense. If a reporter disagrees with me on a factual matter that says nothing except one of us is right and the other wrong. If the reporter and I agree then we are both either right or wrong.

[Michael P]

The question here isn’t — to make up an example — whether a reporter agrees on how to spell “dumbass”, but whether “bernard11” is a synonym of it.

[bye]

But that logically is ridiculouos.
Someone who is impartial to person X will be partial to person Y. and disagreement can be in tandem with partiality or not.

You make the case for anonymous posting but I doubt you see it. If it is really the argument and not the person, REBUT THE ARGUMENT

[Don Nico]

Why don’tyou tell us what you mean by impartial.
For example, is the BBC impartial? I do not find it that way with respect to Israel.
PBS is very far from impartial. It’s editorial POV is predictable on every issue of importance.
Is Fox impartial? Of course not.
Is MNBC impartial? CNN?
I’ll give you an example of impartial, ESPN. Ahhh, but that is just about sports

[Joe_dallas]

agreed
As pointed out on prior thread, npr which is rated as one of the “most Neutral” has numerous examples of highly distorted reporting

[bernard11]

The examples you gave on the prior thread prove nothing except your lack of reading comprehension skills.

[Joe_dallas]

Your repudiation of the examples is simply the same game other leftists play. You believe they are false because you live in an echo chamber.

[Joe_dallas]

Bernard

Do your homework – you simply copied some else’s response who likewise didnt do his homework.

[bernard11]

Fuck you, Joe.

I read your damn links and wrote my own comments. I copied nothing. Did someone else write similar comments? OK. So your lack of comprehension was obvious to others as well as me.

Your links were basically to an NPR reporter who reported that Biden claimed he was fine. And you decided to read that as the reporter saying Biden was fine.

And chided me for not reading non-existent parts of the transcript.

[Joe_dallas]

Bernard –
A – you started the prick comment
B – you made a bigger prick immature comment

you first response was just a repeat of BS copied from DN .

Neither you or DN made any effort to do you homework to ascertain the accuracy of my statements – you simply repeated his comments.

Yes the omission of significant facts is in effect lying. You should be able to grasp that concept.

The other comments are factually correct stories by NPR such which both you and DN denied

NPR likewise flat lied with their expose that a lab leak of covid was

Same with NPR story during the first Trump impeachment with nary a mention of the biden family corruption
Same with the NPR story on the biased judge in the rittenhouse trial with nary a mention of prosecution corruption in the trial.

NPR like the rest of media participated in the cover up of Biden mental decline. DN likewise pushed the coverup.

[Malika the Maiz]

“NPR likewise flat lied with their expose that a lab leak of covid was

Same with NPR story during the first Trump impeachment with nary a mention of the biden family corruption
Same with the NPR story on the biased judge in the rittenhouse trial with nary a mention of prosecution corruption in the trial.”

Of course none of that is lying. It’s not even inaccurate, at worst if true it might be a lack of context.

But joe imagines all kinds of stuff…

[David Nieporent]

Neither you or DN made any effort to do you homework to ascertain the accuracy of my statements – you simply repeated his comments.

So you pull lies out of your ass and you think we’re supposed to make efforts to figure out what the hell you’re talking about and whether they’re true, rather than for you to provide evidence to support them?

Sorry, no, but that’s not how it works. If you claim that NPR is lying, it’s up to you to produce evidence of false stories, not up to us to read all of NPR and guess which stories you might be talking about. Something that would be futile anyway, since you have proven you can’t tell the difference between truth and lies, and have your own Very Special Definition of lying.
​
​
(Oh, and for the avoidance of doubt, “evidence of false stories” means that you provide links to the actual specific stories you are referring to — not vague allusions to story topics.

[Joe_dallas]

DN you get caught repeating lies shows your ethical deficiencies

[David Nieporent]

Uh huh. Once again, bookkeeper_joe doesn’t understand the concept of evidence.

[Joe_dallas]

DN ‘ comment – Sorry, no, but that’s not how it works. If you claim that NPR is lying, it’s up to you to produce evidence of false stories, not up to us to read all of NPR and guess which stories you might be talking about.

DN – I gave specific stories on NPR’s distortions
You chose to ignore instead of cross checking the work – further you stated my comments were false without doing any homework
That shows how ethically compromised you have become.

[David Nieporent]

I gave specific stories on NPR’s distortions

After much teeth pulling, you finally did provide a very few URLs. The problem is, none of them involved distortions.

[Joe_dallas]

Ethics challenged DN

Those links I provided for NPR – showed NPR’s participation in the cover up of Bidens mental health.

Very similar to your participation in promoting the sharp as a tack theme

[David Nieporent]

Those links I provided for NPR – showed NPR’s participation in the cover up of Bidens mental health.

There’s not much point in saying “Uh huh” “Nuh uh” back and forth any further. I know that bookkeeper_joe is lying, bookkeeper_joe knows that bookkeeper_joe is lying, and anyone who cares (which I expect is the null set at this point) can and should go look at the stories themselves rather than relying on either of us.

[TwelveInchPianist]

I dunno. All of the outlets you list seem to cover issues from both sides.

[bye]

It is often unfair to cover from both sides !!! That is how aberrant perverted disgusting jerks get their toehold. We really don’t need a new view on whether arson is morally wrong. On most sexual perversions or personality defects another view is juat a prurient view.

[Joe_dallas]

Why should the taxpayers pay for the biased news reporting?

[Kazinski]

Wrong question, why should the taxpayers pay for any news reporting?

NPR and PBS got upset and quit Twitter when it labled them as Government Affiliated media outlets. So I guess they think the funding is problematic too.

[Joe_dallas]

agreed

[Martinned]

Because news reporting is a public good.

[Malika the Maiz]

That’s very simplistic. Public broadcasting leans left, sure, but that’s not the same as “captured by the Democratic Party.”

Now, if you want to see an outlet that engages in some fair amount of outright coordination with a particular party, there’s the one that rhymes with box.

[Mr. Bumble]

Which of course is a private company that does not receive government funding.

[Joe_dallas]

Of course its censorship if the taxpayers dont fund the biased left leaning reporting!
/s

[Malika the Maiz]

Poor dumb dallas….

[Joe_dallas]

typical inane response

From Llano county liabrary case ” Plaintiffs have a First Amendment right to read books. They don’thave a First Amendment right to force a public library to provide them.”

Hopefully you can grasp the concept

[Malika the Maiz]

I called you dumb because you didn’t get my point which I made to bumble. If you did you’d realize your comment was irrelevant.

[Joe_dallas]

you comment was just a typical immature prick comment.

Secondly you didnt make a comment in reply to Bumble. Read the thread – He replied to you. You did not reply to bumble.

[Malika the Maiz]

I pointed out what a media outlet being captured by a party actually looks like. You didn’t get it and made a immature, irrelevant comment.

And my reply to Bumble is directly below this post, ya goof.

[Joe_dallas]

Malika – The only comment you made to bumble was related to the budget and it occurred later

not only did you get caught lying, you doubled down on the lie

Malika continue your argument with maiz

[Malika the Maiz]

My you’re dumb.

Malika the Maiz 3 hours ago
So it’s a good thing I argued CPB doesn’t do what it does.

Reply Edit

[Joe_dallas]

Malika – you throw immature insults after getting exposed as a liar 4 straight times.
Your response to bumble came after your immature comment to me.

man up and act like an adult/

Malika the Maiz 4 hours ago
Flag Comment
Mute User
I called you dumb because you didn’t get my point which I made to bumble.

Malika the Maiz 3 hours ago
So it’s a good thing I argued CPB doesn’t do what it does.

[Malika the Maiz]

How dumb are you? I posted the reply to Bumble. Here it is again.

Malika the Maiz 3 hours ago
So it’s a good thing I argued CPB doesn’t do what it does.

Reply Edit

So, I responded to
Bumble’s goofy statement that Fox is private that that is irrelevant to my point about what coordination looks like. Now, you missing that point is par for the course, but denying my response to Bumble when it’s there for anyone to read and I’ve cut and pasted it is truly a new level of dumb.

[Joe_dallas]

You are beyond stupid

follow the time line which I gave you

Its now 5 times you tried to cover up.

[Malika the Maiz]

Holy shit, you’re delusional.

Malika the Maiz 5 hours ago
So it’s a good thing I argued CPB doesn’t do what it does.

Reply Edit

Do you deny the first is a response to Bumble from me? Time stamped 5 hours ago like your response to Bumble?

[Joe_dallas]

Holy shit is correct

you cant even follow your own time line

you response to bumble was after that point. Simply start with the first post.

Most people have learned to read a clock by the time they are in the first grade.

[Malika the Maiz]

You claimed I made no reply to Bumble:

Joe_dallas 5 hours ago
Flag Comment
Mute User
you comment was just a typical immature prick comment.

Secondly you didnt make a comment in reply to Bumble. Read the thread – He replied to you. You did not reply to bumble.

You were wrong. Here is the reply.

Malika the Maiz 5 hours ago
So it’s a good thing I argued CPB doesn’t do what it does.

Reply Edit

And it was posted slightly before you posted this:

Joe_dallas 5 hours ago
Flag Comment
Mute User
Of course its censorship if the taxpayers dont fund the biased left leaning reporting!
/s

Reply

Goodness you are dumb!

[Joe_dallas]

Malika the Maiz 12 minutes ago
Flag Comment
Mute User
You claimed I made no reply to Bumble:

Malika – Again lying

I did not claim you did not reply to bumble

What I stated correctly is
A- you did not respond to bumble on this string
B – you reply to bumble at a point in time after my initial comment on this string in the thread – which demonstrates that were accusing me of not understanding a statement you had not yet made.

You suck at being honest

[Malika the Maiz]

You’re demonstrably wrong. Here is a cut and paste of your comment:

Joe_dallas 5 hours ago
Flag Comment
Mute User
you comment was just a typical immature prick comment.

Secondly you didnt make a comment in reply to Bumble. Read the thread – He replied to you. You did not reply to bumble.

You should admit your situation. There would be more dignity in it.

[Joe_dallas]

Malika
My first comment
Joe_dallas 6 hours ago
Of course its censorship if the taxpayers dont fund the biased left leaning reporting!
/s

you response occurred after mine

That is why your comment is posted later in the thread

[Joe_dallas]

Malika – agruing with maiz

Hint – hint – cross check to see where in this thread your post is posted

Malika the Maiz 5 hours ago
So it’s a good thing I argued CPB doesn’t do what it does.

Reply Edit

[Malika the Maiz]

lol, you cut and pasted your comment from the original and my comment from a later cut and paste. Anyone with a brain and eyes can look at these two comments currently and see they have the same hourly time stamp:
Joe_dallas 7 hours ago
Flag Comment
Mute User
Of course its censorship if the taxpayers dont fund the biased left leaning reporting!
/s

Reply
Malika the Maiz 7 hours ago
So it’s a good thing I argued CPB doesn’t do what it does.

Reply Edit

That’s because I posted mine slightly ahead of yours.

[Malika the Maiz]

And anyone can see you’ve changed your story from claiming I did not respond to Bumble to I did not respond to Bumble in this thread.

Joe_dallas 7 hours ago
Flag Comment
Mute User
you comment was just a typical immature prick comment.

Secondly you didnt make a comment in reply to Bumble. Read the thread – He replied to you. You did not reply to bumble.

Malika the Maiz 12 minutes ago
Flag Comment
Mute User
You claimed I made no reply to Bumble:

Malika – Again lying

I did not claim you did not reply to bumble

What I stated correctly is
A- you did not respond to bumble on this string

You’re double busted!

[Joe_dallas]

Malika
Why is your claimed response to Bumble posted later in the thread ?

[Malika the Maiz]

“Malika
Why is your claimed response to Bumble posted later in the thread ?”

It isn’t a claimed response, it’s a demonstrable, actual response. It’s there for all to see. Are you blind or can you not read?

And it is not posted later. All anyone has to do is look at your comment then immediately scroll down to my response to bumble to see they have the exact same hour time stamp (Reason only has hours after the first hour, if they had minutes too it would show my comment preceded yours). Are you unable to scroll or do you not know how to read numbers?

You’re usually a sloppy thinker but this is super dumb.

[Joe_dallas]

Malika the Maiz 3 hours ago

“And it is not posted later.”

Yes it is posted later – that is why your response is posted below my comment

[David Nieporent]

Yes it is posted later – that is why your response is posted below my comment

bookkeeper_joe not only not an expert on science (any field), history, law, or logic, but also incapable of understanding how comment threading works.

[Joe_dallas]

DN ‘ comment – David Nieporent 2 hours ago
Flag Comment
Mute User
Yes it is posted later – that is why your response is posted below my comment

bookkeeper_joe not only not an expert on science (any field), history, law, or logic, but also incapable of understanding how comment threading works.

DN – Get caught being repetitively wrong
Ethically challenged – every leftists should be proud

[Malika the Maiz]

So it’s a good thing I argued CPB doesn’t do what it does.

[Riva]

So, based on your total number of responses here today, I take it that making an ass of yourself in a comments section is your job? Not that I find that surprising given the trolling that stinks up this site. I just find it surprising anyone would actually hire you. Could be they’re just wasting government grant money and frankly don’t give a shit who they hire? I could believe that.

[Joe_dallas]

Riva – the only question is why he hasnt figured out his post was after the one I made! – you can tell from the little dotted lines on the left the sequence of posting.

[TwelveInchPianist]

“Now, if you want to see an outlet that engages in some fair amount of outright coordination with a particular party,”

You think the left wing media came up with “cheapfakes” all by themselves?

[Malika the Maiz]

In which instance?

[TwelveInchPianist]

Tapper and Thomas discuss how shocked the Biden staffers who pushed the story were that they got the MSM to bite.

[Malika the Maiz]

You fund Tapper to be a reliable source, do you?

Also, if true, that would t be coordination, it would be credulousness (like when the MSM repeated W Bush administration’s Iraq intelligence assertions).

[Brett Bellmore]

“Public broadcasting leans left, sure, but that’s not the same as “captured by the Democratic Party.””

I’m glad you’ve admitted it leans left, but how is that not the same as being captured by the Democratic party?

Because they’re voluntary allies rather than captives?

Look, it’s fine if private sector media outlets have preferences for one party over the other. At least, it’s fine so long as there’s a mix…

But government programs should not exhibit that sort of consistent bias in favor of one party, regardless of whether the other party happens to control the government. It calls into question whether elections actually MATTER.

[grb]

Brett Bellmore : “..that sort of consistent bias in favor of one party..”

Total bullshit. I regularly hear every single viewpoint on every issue on NPR. But that’s not good enough for your average professional-victim Rightie. They don’t like listening to perspectives they don’t want to hear. If it’s not nonstop agitprop like Fox, they go into whining butthurt snowflake-mode.

[Mr. Bumble]

Get a hearing test.

[Joe_dallas]

grb 3 minutes ago
Brett Bellmore : “..that sort of consistent bias in favor of one party..”

Total bullshit. I regularly hear every single viewpoint on every issue on NPR. But that’s not good enough for your average professional-victim Rightie.

GRB – you are living in an echo chamber. NPR has a very strong record of distorting key facts and omitting key facts in their stories. Its one thing to have a perspective leaning one direction, its another thing to omit and distort significant facts that for all practical purposes rises to the level of lying. Lying on the taxpayers dime.

[Malika the Maiz]

See the difference between lying and getting things wrong explained below. If getting things wrong is necessarily lying you’re quite the liar!

[Kazinski]

Well here is what IRA Berliner said about that:

“It’s true NPR has always had a liberal bent, but during most of my tenure here, an open-minded, curious culture prevailed. We were nerdy, but not knee-jerk, activist, or scolding.

In recent years, however, that has changed. Today, those who listen to NPR or read its coverage online find something different: the distilled worldview of a very small segment of the U.S. population.

If you are conservative, you will read this and say, duh, it’s always been this way.

But it hasn’t.”

I don’t doubt that you are part of that segment, for that matter so am I except I’m an apostate.

[Brett Bellmore]

If you are a conservative, it HAS ‘always’ been that way. It just took a while for enough distillation passes that Berliner’s own views got excluded, too.

[PaulS]

“I regularly hear every single viewpoint on every issue on NPR” – Wow that is a stunningly broad statement. You’ve heard it all. Not anything one can say in response.

[Malika the Maiz]

“I’m glad you’ve admitted it leans left, but how is that not the same as being captured by the Democratic Party”

Because one is an ideology and the other is an organization. I mean, you lean right, are you captured by the Republican Party?

[Noscitur a sociis]

. Public broadcasting leans left, sure, but that’s not the same as “captured by the Democratic Party.”

That’s a fair point: frequently the Democratic Party is far too moderate to command their approval.

[Malika the Maiz]

I don’t know if I’d say frequently but it happens. That by itself shows a problem with the coordination claim though (critiques from the left can hurt the Dems turnout just like critiques from the right can hurt the GOP).

[Sarcastr0]

I don’t know what NPR shows you listen to but fiery Marxists they are not.

[Bob from Ohio]

Just because they are boring doesn’t mean they aren’t Marxists.

[Bubba Jones]

PBS programming is tailored for old, rich white people. It’s the only thing my parents watch when they aren’t watching Fox News.

We don’t need a government subsidy for that.

[Sarcastr0]

The subsidy is largely not for programming, it is for coverage for in rural areas that otherwise wouldn’t get radio.

https://cpb.org/aboutpb/rural.

Though I think there is some value in us paying a bit for some baseline classical music and jazz even if there is not a business case and I’m not into them.

[ThePublius]

Are you asserting the CPB is impartial?

[post hoc ergo propter hoc]

sesame street is a commie rag. /s

[Bob from Ohio]

First run Sesame Street episodes have not been on PBS since 2016, they get them a few months later. It is HBO and now Netflix.

[Frank Drackman]

That one where Ernie tried to get to sleep by counting Fire Engines still cracks me up

[Dr. Ed 2]

Neither HBO nor Netflix — or the underlying technologies — existed in 1969…

[Dr. Ed 2]

The NEED for public broadcasting has been eliminated by technology.

Look at what was was necessary to merely broadcast audio circa 1965, let alone video. Now look at it today.

Technology in the form of the now obsolete analog/mag tape camcorder created Rodney King in 1990 in a way that was not possible in 1970 (e.g. Kent State) when even the TV stations shot on movie film and then had to convert it to analog TV.

And then MPEG compression and various sites such as Youtube eliminated the broadcast limitations. So if I want to make a children’s television show out of my mother’s old coat and have a 6 foot tall talking bird in it, I can broadcast it myself on the internet — I don’t need PBS. And if schools consider it valuable, they can download it or run it directly to large projection screens.

Sesame Street couldn’t have started in 1969 without the PBS TV resources to first nationally transmit and then broadcast the show. Today, Ed’s Street could be sent from my laptop — I’d probably want more resources at the head end, particularly if I wanted to do it live, but a few large school districts could mirror it, and remember that in 1969, that’s what TV networks did — recorded the network program and then played it from the recording.

And this is without getting into the CATV Public Access programs.

QED the need for PBS no longer exists.

[Sarcastr0]

The radio waves still gotta go out.

Lots of rural places without RoI, absent government subsidy.

[Dr. Ed 2]

Remember UUCP?

[Kazinski]

We aren’t going to get impartial public broadcasting from NPR and PBS.

But don’t take.my word for it:

I’ve Been at NPR for 25 Years. Here’s How We Lost America’s Trust.
https://www.thefp.com/p/npr-editor-how-npr-lost-americas-trust

Oh but at least they can take the criticism and reform from within, Oh I guess not.

NPR suspends veteran editor as it grapples with his public criticism
https://www.npr.org/2024/04/16/1244962042/npr-editor-uri-berliner-suspended-essay

[Malika the Maiz]

Oh, one guy who worked there said it so that’s that. If that’s your standard I got some doozies about the current administration!

[Kazinski]

if that didn’t convince you then maybe this will:

More than 85% of NPR listeners are White.
Median household income is 115k

I think rich white people can take care of themselves without a government subsidy.

And for the record I am a frequent public radio listener, they’ve got a decent jazz station where I live, and no news or fundraisers. If I lose it, I’ll live.

[Malika the Maiz]

The fact that rich white people listen to it proves it’s bias (which is what we’re talking about)? That’s goofy

[Kazinski]

_

[Kazinski]

No, it proves it doesn’t need a government subsidy.

Everything is biased in one way or another so that isn’t a huge bother for me.

But because everything is biased nothing should be subsidized.

[bye]

you both lost logic.
There is what some media does and there’s what kind of person likes what that media does. But you can’t tell why a male, elderly, Catholic, white ,conservative, heterorsexual listens to “X”, Maybe it has nothing to do with any of those traits.
This immediately puts me in the mind of a Borders’ bookstore event in DC many years ago a couple of white Jewish guys were talking about their book on the Blues…told me that, no, Canned Heat and Michael Bloomfield and Paul Butterfied are not Blues because they are white guys, and BB King’s Thrill is Gone is not Blues because of the production on the record — not one Black person in attendance, non-Blacks telling non-Blacks what the Blues is and why all their reasons for liking Blues proves they don’t like the Blues.

[bye]

But to say that ‘everyone supports it” and then be against everyone supporting it rather than the government, seems silly.
IF NPR is what you say then it has no need of propping up

[Drewski]

“9.4 billion isn’t enough, but more is coming:”

Oh, well, if a guy who goes by the name of a notorious domestic terrorist says so after refreshing the site at 2 am to get the first comment in, who am I to argue? The best opinions all come from unemployed political extremists.

[Kazinski]

Not that it matters, but I live in Arizona, so it was barely after midnight when I posted that, that’s fairly early for me, but don’t worry I got a full nights sleep in.

[Malika the Maiz]

lol, what the Mad King went to the mat for was his “big, beautiful bill” which even his vizier Elon called a pork laden abomination destined to blow up the deficit. But keep hoping on your King there, Kaz, lord knows he’s never conned a dupe like you before!

[Joe_dallas]

We agree the big beautiful bill has lots of pork

Though when did you complain about the inflation reduction act ?

Consistency ?

[Malika the Maiz]

I did, here. Especially the green new deal nonsense.

So, wrong again.

[Joe_dallas]

Malika the Maiz 28 minutes ago
Flag Comment
Mute User
I did, here. Especially the green new deal nonsense.

Thats Quite dubious given your track record

[Malika the Maiz]

You’re wrong yet again. Fund one comment here where I supported the green new deal. I’ve always said here it was full of nonsense.

[Kazinski]

Well then you will be glad to hear most of the tax credits were killed in the reconciliation bill.

[Malika the Maiz]

There’s definitely stuff in the bill I’m more than fine with, though overall it’s not good.

[Kazinski]

Soon is actually a little confused, the bill itself has vary little spending, its not a spending bill, but it doesn’t cut much spending is the problem. That’s what these follow on recession bills are for, which are separate.

Here is a good summary of what’s in the reconciliation bill:
https://www.crfb.org/blogs/house-reconciliation-bill-barely-slows-spending-growth

[hobie]

I don’t get why you insurrectionists hate NPR. I listen to NPR every day because it is the only non-partisan, objective radio today. The hosts never offer opinion. Never. Mornings nationwide are for local issues like Ohio school boards, bond issues, the Browns new stadium. Afternoons are general interest things like gardening (last week was about proper orchid cultivation), art, science, health, music (last week was Caribbean folk music), cooking.

Is it that they don’t devote 24/7 to tiny, microscopic Saint Ashtray Babbitt? To 24/7 woke trans story hours?

[Frank Drackman]

OK, I know I’m a Rear-Echelon MF, but your comment sounds like AI, and bad AI at that,
“Mornings nationwide are for local issues…?” what does that even mean? That National Pubic broadcasts Nationwide about Ohio local Ish-Yews?
The Atlanta Station, “WABE” (The “ABE” stands for the Atlanta Board of Ed-jew-ma-cation” which owns the station, oh yeah, they’re real impartial) plays the National Pubic Radio News every hour, and most of their shows, “All Liberal Things Considered”, used to enjoy a “Prairie Home Companion” until they cancelled it for some reason,
“Saint Ashtray” ?? sounded funnier when it was about Jews

Frank

[hobie]

This makes my point. You hayseeds don’t even listen to it; you have no idea what they broadcast. Your handlers just tell you what to hate and you fall in line

[Joe_dallas]

hobie 2 hours ago
Flag Comment
Mute User
“I don’t get why you insurrectionists hate NPR. I listen to NPR every day because it is the only non-partisan, objective radio today.””

You have to live in a heavily padded echo chamber cell to believe NPR is non-partisan.

[Malika the Maiz]

Ipse dixit from a delusional dude. Why didn’t you just deny hobie made a post lol

[Commenter_XY]

On the spending side, I am very disappointed, Kaz. The price for the Big, Beautiful Bill seems dear (too much so, for me). DOGE needs to deliver more in 2025. So does Team R in Congress.

We need more spending reductions and a dramatic slowdown of debt growth.

[TwelveInchPianist]

Legal expert: If only Ilya Somin’s 401K were affected by immigration, maybe he would write about that instead of just tariffs.

[Kazinski]

That’s hilarious :

“In the movement conservative publication Reason, law professor Ilya Somin writes: “From the very beginning, I have contended that the virtually limitless nature of the authority claimed by Trump is a key reason why courts must strike down the tariffs.… I am glad to see the CIT judges agreed with our argument on this point!” If only abducting immigrants and sending them to torture camps affected the 401Ks of the people at Reason, we could have even more conservatives who understand that the “virtually limitless nature of the authority claimed by Trump” is indeed a very bad thing.”

If Reason is a movement conservative publication then they are doing it wrong.

[bye]

Notice too that lawyers almost always bypass the absurdity or common-sensicality of something and head for the legal arcana.
Somin says some crazy shit that my neighbors would rear up at him about.
He wrote an opium-dream article about Nationalism for example
https://www.nationalaffairs.com/publications/detail/the-case-against-nationalism

The Founders all the way up to Lincoln wanted the nationalism that he deplores. SHARED VALUES, religious, Biblical, natural law, logos. That is what stopped bigamy and slavery: Nationalism

Let every American, every lover of liberty, every well wisher to his posterity, swear by the blood of the Revolution, never to violate in the least particular, the laws of the country; and never to tolerate their violation by others. As the patriots of seventy-six did to the support of the Declaration of Independence, so to the support of the Constitution and Laws, let every American pledge his life, his property, and his sacred honor;–let every man remember that to violate the law, is to trample on the blood of his father, and to tear the character of his own, and his children’s liberty. Let reverence for the laws, be breathed by every American mother, to the lisping babe, that prattles on her lap–let it be taught in schools, in seminaries, and in colleges; let it be written in Primers, spelling books, and in Almanacs;–let it be preached from the pulpit, proclaimed in legislative halls, and enforced in courts of justice. And, in short, let it become the POLITICAL RELIGION of the nation

And I know what Ilya will counter so let me quote further
“I have never had a feeling politically that did not spring from the sentiments embodied in the Declaration of Independence”

So here it is , Ilya
The CREATOR
“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness”.

Oh and probably Ilya has done that sleight of hand about Pursuit of Happiness (most of the REASON staff has already done it) , to make it into some Enlightenment or secular principle

“For the founders, the pursuit of happiness was the individual right to pursue a life lived in harmony with the law of nature and a public duty to govern in accordance with that law.”

Her dissertation adds : ” the idea that those first principles were discoverable by humans, and the belief that to pursue a life lived in accordance with those principles was to pursue a life of virtue, with the end result of happiness”

For Blackstone—the figure perhaps most central to Prof. Conklin’s new book—these conclusions are sewn together in an ethical relationship in which practicing eternal justice and experiencing happiness are the reflexive byproducts of adherence to the first principles of creation (synonymous, for him, with the foundation of natural law). For the United States’ founding generation, this translated into a causal link between living virtuously and living happily, though as Prof. Conklin noted in wrapping up her talk, virtue came by many different names for this generation, ranging from Jefferson’s binaries—“prudence not folly,” “justice not deceit,” “fortitude not fear”—to Adams’ punctuality and benevolence (among others), to the thirteen virtues on Franklin’s daily checklist, which included silence, order, frugality, justice, and humility, defined by the Philadelphian as “imitat[ing] Jesus and Socrates.”

[bye]

Just saw this too

Janice Rogers Brown (former circuit judge of the US Court of Appeals for the DC Circuit) examined the founders’ understanding of the people’s right to pursue happiness. According to Judge Brown, the founders believed the government’s goal is to create virtuous habits in its citizenry, because they saw virtue as the key to individual happiness and self-governance.

Virtue, the very word makes the trans and gay crown cringe.

[Krayt]

Be ye kind.

[Dr. Ed 2]

Jefferson was a student of Locke, and plagiarized that line from Locke, except that Locke wrote it:

“Life, Liberty, & Property.”

Jefferson was living in the era of property requirements for voting, so Jefferson changed it to “pursuit of happiness” so as to make it clear that all (and not just the propertied) had these rights, and by 1868 the concept of property rights for voting had largely disappeared which is why the original “life, liberty, and property” appears in the 14th Amendment.

Regardless of what some judge says — this is historically accurate.

[bye]

Well you are wrong even on the understanding of ‘property’

LINCOLN
The sweat of one’s brow is the source of one’s property. In Lincoln’s rendering, it is sinful to deny another (that is, the slave) the fruits of his labor. Herein lies the sin of slavery.

“Capital is only the fruit of labor, and could never have existed if labor had not first existed. Labor is the superior of capital, and deserves much the higher consideration.”

—Abraham Lincoln, 18611

Thus, his belief that a major function of government was securing property earned justly by the sweat of the laborer’s brow.

[Dr. Ed 2]

Jefferson was a student of Locke, and plagiarized that line from Locke, except that Locke wrote it:

“Life, Liberty, & Property.”

Jefferson was living in the era of property requirements for voting, so Jefferson changed it to “pursuit of happiness” so as to make it clear that all (and not just the propertied) had these rights, and by 1868 the concept of property rights for voting had largely disappeared which is why the original “life, liberty, and property” appears in the 14th Amendment.

Regardless of what some judge says — this is historically accurate.

[Frank Drackman]

Like with the name “Barbituric Acid” for the first Barbiturate synthesized by Adolf von Bayer in 1864, (and named by him) the source of the name was a mystery for years, some thought it might have referenced “Schlusselbart” (beard of a Key), some Saint Barbara, as it was discovered on his day, turns out old Adolf had a girlfriend named “Barbara”
All that is to say, I think old Jeffy just had a Slave named “Happiness”

Frank

[Kazinski]

That’s not why the 14th amendment protects property instead of the pursuit of happiness.

Its because quite often people need protection of the law from those that pursue too much happiness.

[bye]

Totally false, and that explains WHY he didn’t just crib Locke.
Property also referred to ownership of one’s self, which included a right to personal well being.
A more extensive examination of the development from Locke’s ideas to Jefferson’s is located in the essay
Jeffersonian Revisions of Locke, written by David Post. A chief area of difference, in Post’s essay, is that “for
Jefferson natural rights had roots in human nature,” and thus the right to liberty was to be maintained in a higher
pedestal than the right of property; conversely, Locke “treated all rights as though they were properties.”

Natural rights, for Jefferson, are axiomatically
of a higher order than those conferred by the government or society; if the expansion of property
rights yields conflict with natural rights, property rights must derive from one such lower order.
Jefferson, on this occasion, opposed Locke

Property rights as
natural rights found a home in Lockean ideology, but no approbation in Jeffersonian

And, NOTE :
In The Second Treatise, Locke lists the natural
rights of “life, liberty, and estate,” with “estate” being what we today
would call “property.”

The Virginia Declaration of Rights, which Jefferson had with him as he drafted
the Declaration of Independence, lists the inherent rights of “the enjoyment of life and liberty, with the
means of acquiring and possessing property, and pursuing and obtaining happiness and safety.”

Mason’s listing suggests that far from
omitting property and inserting pursuit of happiness in its place, Jefferson
was following in a tradition that viewed property and pursuit of happiness
as two distinct rights.

[grb]

bye : “…SHARED VALUES…”

Go back into the history of this country and you can find this “shared values” crap used by demagogues to incite the mobs against the Catholics, Jews, Italians, Irish, Germans, Chinese, and Japanese.

And your side, bye, is always proved wrong in the end. Not occasionally or even the majority of times, but always. The people who raged against (say) the Italians as being brutes who couldn’t ever become productive citizens are now seen as shortsighted fools. Someday, bye, they’ll say the same thing about you. Turns out this country is much greater that someone who obsesses about skin tones could ever imagine.

[bye]

GRB, you are ignorant and I do not have “a side”

This has always been my motto about shared values
LINCOLN

August 24, 1855: Letter to Joshua F. Speed

I am not a Know-Nothing. That is certain. How could I be? How can any one who abhors the oppression of negroes, be in favor of degrading classes of white people? Our progress in degeneracy appears to me to be pretty rapid. As a nation, we begin by declaring that “all men are created equal.” We now practically read it “all men are created equal, except negroes.” When the Know-Nothings get control, it will read “all men are created equal, except negroes, and foreigners, and catholics.” When it comes to this I should prefer emigrating to some country where they make no pretence of loving liberty-to Russia, for instance, where despotism can be taken pure, and without the base alloy of hypocracy [sic].

[post hoc ergo propter hoc]

it’s avowedly libertarian. “When you support Reason Foundation with your tax-deductible gift, you support our mission to advance a free society by developing, applying, and promoting libertarian principles, including individual liberty, free markets, and the rule of law.”

the volokh conspiracy is “often libertarian” but the two are separate. “Mostly law professors | Sometimes contrarian | Often libertarian | Always independent | Est. 2002”. the rest of reason is quite a bit more militant and unhinged.

[jb]

Pre-Trump, most conservatives were in favor of limited government.

It’s true that Reason and libertarianism more generally aren’t well aligned with MAGA, but outside of political coalitions that doesn’t mean it’s not conservative.

[John F. Carr]

I got hit by a drive-by class action last week. A card in the mail offered me $150 to compensate for a data breach. Kind of low, but maybe. I did a little research. Divide the fixed sum settlement by the number of class members and the average recovery is about $3.

Perhaps I can make them spend $150 in paralegal time by filing an objection. This is the kind of deal that simply should not be allowed. Real damages for the average class member or nothing at all.

There’s a business reply card to mail back (postage paid by recipient). I remember a silly SF story from long ago where our hero fabricates a brick of neutronium and sticks it to such a card to cost the business roughly the world GDP in postage. In reality the Post Office has a policy of not accepting items like bricks attached to business reply envelopes.

[Dr. Ed 2]

I ran across one of those as what had to be an identity theft operation — the last for digits of your SSN are the only ones that can’t be predicted if you know where and when someone got the number. But they wanted to know more and it screamed “identity theft.”

[ObviouslyNotSpam]

Probably because they won’t get paid more for delivering it.

But from when I lived in the UK, I recall there being a rumoured dirty trick related to underpaying the postage on a letter or package. Apparently, Royal Mail would obligingly accept for delivery anything, so long as it had been sent with some level of postage paid–and would seek to recover the balance due from the recipient before completing delivery. I don’t recall if this trick worked for construction materials, but rumour had it that it definitely worked for pet-related byproducts…

[John F. Carr]

My memory says USPS used to deliver mail “postage due” and now returns to sender instead.

[Noscitur a sociis]

I think you may not understand the theory of a class action.

[Brett Bellmore]

No, I think he’s observing that the theory and the practice are radically different. And that the practice is that some rando lawyer sues in the name of a class, and then reaps most of the award for himself, with the class members getting a nominal amount.

[Mr. Bumble]

…and it seems these never go to trial but get settled when the lawyers see a figure big enough to keep them in the lifestyle they’ve become accustomed to.
Also, really hate the settlements where you receive a coupon or other discount for buying the same product.

[John F. Carr]

The Class Action Fairness Act made coupon settlements less valuable to plaintiffs’ lawyers.

[Noscitur a sociis]

I guess you also don’t understand the purpose of a class action either.

[Mr. Bumble]

So enlighten us.

[TwelveInchPianist]

To make lawyers money?

[Bwaaah]

Sure, but they have to cut you in for some of it. I call it an “incidental societal benefit.”

[post hoc ergo propter hoc]

This is the kind of deal that simply should not be allowed. Real damages for the average class member or nothing at all.

look at frcp 23 and it’s history, https://www.law.cornell.edu/rules/frcp/rule_23 joinder of all interested parties is an old equity rule, and damages are legal. you’re conflating the equitable procedure with the legal remedy. they’re separate issues.

As Justice Story explained in West v. Randall, 29 F. Cas. 718, 721 (1820) :

“The reason is that the court may be enabled to make a complete decree between the parties, may prevent future litigation by taking away the necessity of a multiplicity of suits, and may make it perfectly certain, that no injustice shall be done, either to the parties before the court, or to others, who are interested by a decree, that may be grounded upon a partial view only of the real merits.” Id.

[grb]

John F. Carr : “I got hit by a drive-by class action….”

While hiking the AT, I had a bout of foot problems and holed-up a few days at a church hostel near the Delaware Water Gap. One of the other guys there was a lawyer from somewhere in the Midwest and his gig (as described) was providing background coordination services for other law firms doing class action lawsuits. Per him, this was a highly profitable niche with extremely limited competition.

At one point we met the church Pastor, a handsome older women. As the lawyer described his job, I saw her mouth twist into a moue of distaste.

[Commenter_XY]

I learned a new word: moue. Nice.

[bernard11]

Did you hike the entire trail, or just a section?

Have you read Bill Bryson’s A Walk in the Woods?

[grb]

I did the entire thing, from Maine to Georgia. Most people go the other way, but the timing precluded that. This was during the Great Recession & I was out of work and in the midst of divorce. The woods just seemed the place to be. And everyone on the trail has inevitably read Bryson. When I met a group of kids from England and asked how they ended up in the mountains of Vermont, the answer was entirely predictable. I’m on the very cusp of retirement and think to do the Pacific Crest Trail thereafter. I expect everyone I meet there will have read Wild.

Settling aside occasional bouts of physical suffering, hardship & misery, the AT is one of the most positive experience you’ll ever have. Everyone is in it together and the communities along the Trail have a tradition of greeting hikers with exceptional kindness.

[John F. Carr]

Paul Cassell thought that Boeing’s non-prosecution agreement would basically guarantee a guilty verdict if the case went to trial. Boeing admitted in writing that it was guilty as sin and agreed not to argue otherwise. We won’t find out what a jury would say because the Trump Administration decided (a) Boeing is too big to fail, and/or (b) white collar crime is too small to prosecute.

Coincidentally, the Ninth Circuit recently reviewed the law of what evidentiary rights the defendant could waive in plea agreements and what the consequences are after a deal fell through. The law is harsher on defendants than I thought. In the case at hand the defendant won. The court had to distinguish all the precedent where the defendant lost. U.S. v. Valdes, https://cdn.ca9.uscourts.gov/datastore/opinions/2025/05/29/23-3214.pdf

[loki13]

Thanks. I missed the Boeing news somehow!

(Quick review)- so Cassell got involved in his favorite cause- setting aside guilty plea agreements for the victims. Got it heard by …. Reed O’Connor. Because of course.

O’Connor did his thing as usual (set the plea agreement aside) and for the usual reasons (how dare an agreement call for the Justice Department to monitor the situation when REED O’CONNOR is available).

Then Boeing was like, “Wut? Go take the crazy somewhere else. We are fighting this.”

And the Justice Department drops the case. Of course, Cassell is on it. Eh ….

[Dr. Ed 2]

Boeing is like Chrysler circa 1980, it’s essential for the national defense, but it also deserves to fail. CONRAIL is a good example — the govt kept the wreckage of PennCentral viable for a couple of decades until commercial rail could buy it.

Boeing is why those astronauts got stuck in the space station.

[tylertusta]

Unfortunately, Boeing is too big to fail.

The company is a strategic asset and anything that prevents the company from building aircraft would have massive geopolitical ramifications.

[Kazinski]

And unfortunately Airbus and Boeing are most competitive is seeing who can be the most dysfunctional.

[shawn_dude]

The government is in the midst of walloping the economy with extreme tariffs under the guise of ensuring strategic on-shoring of steel and aluminum production. Good to know that we don’t care about competence, just existence.

[John F. Carr]

Bloomberg Law reports there isn’t enough money to pay appointed counsel in federal criminal cases. I would rephrase that as, there isn’t enough money to the rates they have customarily been paid. These private attorneys normally pay the costs of defense, such as expert witnesses, up front and seek reimbursement.

https://news.bloomberglaw.com/us-law-week/defense-lawyers-face-months-without-pay-as-federal-funds-dry-up

I suppose they are stuck with the cases they have. They can’t dump a criminal defendant without permission from the judge. They can decline to take new cases.

It’s been a week since private appointed counsel in Massachusetts stopped taking on new cases. I haven’t seen any news.

[Dr. Ed 2]

Maura spent all the money on illegal aliens — Cape Cod has eliminated Tuesday Meals on Wheels for the same reason.

[John F. Carr]

Last year the Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts ruled that life without parole was an unconstitutionally harsh punishment for a 19 year old. One teenaged murderer formerly sentenced to life without parole was resentenced last week. He will be eligible for parole when he turns 79. In other words, he was resentenced to life without parole but the legal nitpickers are happy.

https://www.bostonglobe.com/2025/06/03/metro/daniel-randall-north-attleborough-resentenced-double-murder/

[Dr. Ed 2]

If we had public executions of teenaged murders, it would serve as a deterrent — so to here.

[John F. Carr]

Age isn’t important. If we had speedy and public executions of anybody capital punishment might be a deterrent.

[Mr. Bumble]

Chances are slim and none.

[Mr. Bumble]

Chances are slim and none and if anything would probably increase calls for the abolition of the death penalty.

[Frank Drackman]

There’s a “Death Penalty” it’s just imposed by prisoners on other prisoners.

[ObviouslyNotSpam]

Criminal sentencing is one of those areas where the law must bend not to reality, but to the reality of elections.

Anyone who has studied criminology knows that lengthy sentences do not significantly “deter” criminals from committing crime, primarily because the people who commit crimes generally do not plan their activities in view of the expected consequences. Or, rather, they generally do not expect to be caught at all (or they wouldn’t do the crime in the first place), so they have almost no regard whatsoever for the details of the potential consequences, i.e., a prison sentence.

And yet, the public consistently demands that its elected representatives show how much they “really hate crime”, and, it turns out, the easiest way to for a legislator to do that is to propose longer and longer sentences (or make more things criminally punishable). Much easier than actually reducing crime, anyway!

Moreover, if it weren’t for the rather inconvenient 8th Amendment, our legislators could instead compete on the basis of creatively unusual punishments to satisfy the voters’ lust, but sadly that constitutional restriction means longer and longer sentences are about the only realistic option.

[Martinned]

And yet, the public consistently demands that its elected representatives show how much they “really hate crime”, and, it turns out, the easiest way to for a legislator to do that is to propose longer and longer sentences (or make more things criminally punishable). Much easier than actually reducing crime, anyway!

Particularly in a system where basically anyone who’s ever been on the wrong end of the criminal justice system doesn’t vote.

[Brett Bellmore]

Never heard of “incapacitation”?

[Martinned]

There are cheaper ways to do that.

[Brett Bellmore]

Are there? Really?

I’ve read that your average burglar causes hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of losses each year, making locking them up in prison actually quite a bargain. I would not be shocked to find the numbers were similar for other crimes that involve victims. Crime generally doesn’t pay well relative to the damage it causes, so career criminals have to cause a LOT of damage to support themselves.

[Martinned]

House arrest costs a fraction of what a (human rights compliant) prison sentence costs.

[moresignallessnoise]

How does house arrest work on a violent professional criminal? Can he only prey on persons who enter his house? Are you going to indemnify victims of “house arrested” theft and injury? Can they move to a house next to a school or playground? Why not just pay them for everyday they don’t get caught?

[Martinned]

It’s almost as if not all problems can be solved the same way!

[Malika the Maiz]

“I’ve read that your average burglar causes hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of losses each year”

I quite doubt that. The average burglary costs about 2,000 dollars. The average burglar would have to commit hundreds of successful burglaries to get to your figure. Must criminals are impulsive so I doubt the average burglar is successfully committing that many.

[Malika the Maiz]

Btw-source for my number:

https://ucr.fbi.gov/crime-in-the-u.s/2019/crime-in-the-u.s.-2019/topic-pages/burglary#:~:text=Victims%20of%20burglary%20offenses%20suffered,per%20burglary%20offense%20was%20%242%2C661.

[not guilty]

I suspect that Brett got his figure from that noted authority, Otto Hizass.

[Brett Bellmore]

Yes, the number I’ve seen for individual burglaries is similar, about $2,500.

You have to distinguish between opportunistic burglars, and career burglars. I was talking about the latter.

I suppose that for the first burglary you could settle for an ankle monitor, (With removal being a serious strict liability offense!) and restitution. That way they’d know that they would absolutely be caught if they did it again.

Once somebody is a repeat offender, lock them up.

A Tiny Number of Shoplifters Commit Thousands of New York City Thefts

This is the usual pattern seen with crime: The majority of crime is committed by a small number of high frequency repeat offenders, and incapacitating them has a disproportionate payoff.

[Malika the Maiz]

You said *average* burglar. By definition that’s not “a tiny number of…”

Also, shoplifting is not burglary.

[not guilty]

Forget it, Jake Malika. It’s Bret Town.

[Brett Bellmore]

The “average burglar” in the sense of the burglar you find committed the average burglary. There are a lot of people who commit one off burglaries, and a small number of people who commit so many burglaries that they’re responsible for over half of them, and thus are “average burglars”.

So it would make sense to incapacitate with an ankle monitor on the first offense, and then lock their asses up on the 2nd, because if there’s a 2nd, you know they’re just going to keep doing it.

[Malika the Maiz]

Everyone who commits a burglary is a burglar so the most natural understanding of “average burglar” is a guy who looks most like anyone who commits one.

Even given your meaning we 1. Don’t know if burglary is like that (you cited shoplifting) and 2. Even if it is there could be a difference between committed and successful.

[Dr. Ed 2]

It’s worse than that, Brett — a lot of property crimes today are used to fuel drug use (which ain’t cheap) — so merely keeping them away from drugs reduces crime.

[John F. Carr]

You mean locking somebody up to prevent future crimes? The rationale for eliminating life without parole is the immaturity of young criminals. If they’re going to grow up and learn to control their impulses they don’t need to be locked up forever for society’s protection.

[TwelveInchPianist]

The rational for eliminating life without parole is like with any decision, it’s better to wait to have more information than to commit early on to one course of action.

The rational for life without parole in the first place is to counter the death penalty proponents’ claim that it forecloses the possibility of parole at some point.

[Bubba Jones]

Life without parole should be reserved for capital crimes.

[David Nieporent]

…and Yankees fans.

But wait, same thing.

[bernard11]

WFB is certainly “late,” but there is some question about “great.”

[Jmaie]

Depends on what you’re measuring. His political stances certainly had no appeal for many. His use of the language, however, should be recognized by all as exceptional.

“During one episode of “Firing Line,” Buckley used the word “irenic,” provoking his seething guest to demand why he didn’t just say “peaceful.” Buckley answered: “I desired that extra syllable.””

I can’t find a quote but I remember hearing of a time he was RSVP’ing to an invitation. He answered something like, “I will be unable to attend. I can arrange a trip to Australia if necessary.”

Cheers.

[bernard11]

Hey. Who’s your team, the Dodgers? Hate to break the news but the Boys of Summer (great book) left town quite a while ago.

[Frank Drackman]

As the late great William F. Buckley said, if there are going to be Rapes and Murders being committed, it’s better for them to happen in Attica State Prison than in Central Park.

[Malika the Maiz]

Or in the bedroom of the writer of the Frank Fakeman persona!

[Frank Drackman]

You sure spend a lot of time responding to a fake person, oh (George Thoroughgood music starts)
Done tole you, ain’t got no job, how I sposed to get money to pay dis rent?

[Malika the Maiz]

I like to laugh at the sad weirdo who maintains the Frank Fakeman character, yes.

[tylertusta]

Lengthy sentences have at least one positive effect: it removes recidivist criminals from the public so they cannot commit even more crimes against the people.

[Frank Drackman]

See my William F Buckley comment, on the other hand, Ted Bundy hasn’t done much since his execution

[Riva]

I would not be averse to looking at criminal justice reforms. Prison reform is where changes are desperately needed. Rehabilitation is a joke and a criminal sentence served should not be a permanent impediment to full participation in society. That nonsense invites recidivism.

[bye]

Losing your life is an unconstitutionally harsh punishment for the victim .
In this life of compromise it might be best to have HARSHER sentences so that the conscienceless among Biden’s 20 million illegals won’t even be tempted.

IT still stands, you fake Libertarians:
“Mercy to the guilty is cruelty to the innocent” Adam Smith “The Theory of Moral Sentiments”. The quote highlights the potential harm that misplaced compassion can inflict on those who have been wronged.

[Frank Drackman]

Clarence Thomas said it best in Davis v Ayala (576 U.S. 257 (2015)
“I write separately only to point out, in response to the separate opinion of Justice Kennedy, that the accommodations in which Ayala is housed are a far sight more spacious than those in which his victims, Ernesto Dominguez Mendez, Marcos Antonio Zamora and Jose Luis Rositas, now rest. And, given that his victims were all 31 years of age or under, Ayala will soon have had as much or more time to enjoy those accommodations as his victims had time to enjoy this earth.”

[bye]

IF I stretch out my left hand about 2-3 feet there it is in my library

The Supreme Court Opinions of Clarence Thomas, 1991-2006: A Conservative’s Perspective
by Henry Mark Holzer

I wouldn’t call him Conservative or Originalist. He , as a Catholic and American, accepts the shared principles of the Founders. I am exactly like him far as I can discover. And this is true of Lincoln. I’ve probably read all his important writings plus a couple thousand pages of analysis. He and Thomas are soul-mates

THOMAS
For Justice Clarence Thomas, the foundation of all our law lies in the self-evident truths of the Declaration of Independence, beginning with human equality.
https://www.thepublicdiscourse.com/2014/03/12899/

LINCOLN
Abraham Lincoln said, “I have never had a feeling politically that did not spring from the sentiments embodied in the Declaration of Independence

Took my years of study to boil it down but now I SEE it

[Malika the Maiz]

I thought federal precedent (Graham) said there must be a chance for parole?

[not guilty]

In Graham v. Florida, 560 U.S. 48, 74 (2010), SCOTUS held that for a juvenile offender who did not commit homicide the Eighth Amendment forbids the sentence of life without parole.

In Miller v. Alabama, 567 U.S. 460, 479 (2012), the Court held that mandatory life without parole for those under the age of 18 at the time of their crimes violates the Eighth Amendment’s prohibition on cruel and unusual punishments. Miller does not preclude sentencing a juvenile offender to life without parole under a system where the sentencer is allowed to consider mitigating factors.

[John F. Carr]

The Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts extended the parole eligibility requirement up to 20 years old as a matter of state constitutional law. The defendant has the benefit of this new rule of state constitutional law. Under federal constitutional law the original sentence of life without parole was allowable because the defendant was not under 18.

[not guilty]

I represented a high school shooter who shot a teacher and a student to death and seriously wounded another teacher. The intended victim was an assistant principal, who was unhurt. The jury convicted on two counts of premeditated murder and two counts of attempt to commit premeditated murder and sentenced the defendant to life imprisonment without possibility of parole.

The trial judge sentenced the defendant to two additional 25 year terms of imprisonment and ran all sentences consecutively. I argued on appeal that because consecutive life sentences without parole is a metaphysical impossibility, it should be a legal impossibility as well. On this point the appellate court opined, “Deciding this issue, we are guided less by the strictures of logic than we are by precedent.” https://www.casemine.com/judgement/us/5914ba3aadd7b0493478fb20

The appellate court did reduce each of the attempted murder sentences from 25 to 21 years, so now after the defendant is reincarnated for the second time, he will have only 42 years left to serve rather than 50 years.

[Mr. Bumble]

…and the point is?

[Martinned]

That the American criminal justice system is already a draconian nightmare.

[tylertusta]

Should he have gotten a pat on the back?

“Sorry! Maybe you’ll get the assistant principal next time!”

[Don Nico]

then don’t get caught when you visit the US

[Martinned]

I don’t think you have to worry about me visiting the US for the time being. My VC comments alone would get me sent back at the border.

[not guilty]

The point is the absurdity of imposing multiple, consecutive sentences of life imprisonment without possibility of parole.

Why am I unsurprised that you missed it?

[Mr. Bumble]

Would it be different if the ran concurrently?

[Krayt]

Life without parole, if I understand correctly, is sometimes itself a fraud, as people in certain jurisdictions get parole anyway.

If he can get paroled anyway, parole your way out of 400 years. That seems to be what this is about. (I add I don’t know for this jurisdiction.)

I’d suggest cleaning up the terminology first. Life without parole, without the life part, or the parole part, sounds like something a politician would do for the voter brownie points.

[Frank Drackman]

Referencing the old joke, it’s more like
“LIFE……….with Unga-Bunga!!!!”
I think I’d take the injection (the lethal version, not the Unga-Bunga)

[Bwaaah]

Mr. Guilty is only opposed to some absurdities, but not all. It is not absurdity that troubles him, but just some particular instances of it.

Said the politician, “We’re serious about crime. He was found guilty and sentenced to prison.”

Said the latest victim, “He was found guilty, received a suspended prison sentence, and was therefore immediately set free.”

If they cleaned up the language, how would they hide their deceit?

[Brett Bellmore]

The point was to put him away for good even if each of the life sentences later got converted to fixed term.

If you could be confident life without parole would actually STICK, it would indeed have been absurd.

[Life of Brian]

Just in the interest of completeness, you also argued that it was a “gross abuse of discretion” for the jury to impose a life sentence w/o parole for walking up to a teacher in a high school, pointing a rifle at her head, and pulling the trigger.

You were trying to get him back out while he was still alive, not just clean up some academic pinhead issue.

[not guilty]

I was representing my client. Do you find that noteworthy or otherwise remarkable, LoB?

[Life of Brian]

Oh, besides the fact you were doing your puffing up thing and glossing over the ultimate reason for arguing against consecutive life sentences, it’s just always illuminating to see exactly the sort of vile subhumans someone who solemnly assures us that, e.g., “no prudent lawyer undertakes to represent a schmuck like Trump” has opted to vigorously represent himself.

[Bubba Jones]

The point of the multiple, consecutive life sentences is to ensure this person stays in prison in the unlikely event that any single conviction or sentence is overturned.

This is a pragmatic question, not a metaphysical one.

[ObviouslyNotSpam]

Wouldn’t it be better to execute him, you know, just in case?

[bye]

Reminds me of what I heard about victims of natural disasters:Those who lose EVERYTHING do far better than even those who lose only half.
I think a life sentence more merciful than 42 years left. At some point you have to see things as they are. You killed and you were punished, in 42 years you aren’t like going to be walking through spring fields of flowers and butterflies. It is a fiction that destroys even repentance.

[Dr. Ed 2]

Speaking as a former teacher, he should have been executed.

Old enough to kill, old enough to die.

[Stephen Lathrop]

Several years ago I commented qbout a general deciine in insects, which in my personal experience seeded widespread and alarming. My focus at the time was GMO agriculture.

Noted VC indoorsman David Nieporet, objected, persistently. To the point of opening comments of his own to bring up the subject, and mock me repeatedly. I still have no idea what pushed his buttons, other than a chance to assert my observations were not worth mentioning, because I was personally unqualified.

Anyway:
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2025/jun/03/climate-species-collapse-ecology-insects-nature-reserves-aoe

[Mr. Bumble]

As with most of these “ecological disaster stories” (especially from the likes of the Guardian) with a large helping of salt.

[Stephen Lathrop]

Reposted from above, to correct too many typos, after edit time ran out.

Several years ago I commented about a general deciine in insects, which in my personal experience seemed widespread and alarming. My focus at the time was GMO agriculture.

Noted VC indoorsman David Nieporent objected, persistently. To the point of opening comments of his own, to reopen the subject in subsequent threads, and mock me repeatedly. I still have no idea what pushed his buttons, other than a chance to assert my observations were not worth mentioning, because I was personally unqualified to notice such a thing.

Anyway:
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2025/jun/03/climate-species-collapse-ecology-insects-nature-reserves-aoe

[Dr. Ed 2]

There is talk of exterminating mosquitoes — introducing a genetic defect where the daughters don’t have ovaries and hence are sterile.

Should it be done?

[ThePublius]

No. Many creatures rely on mosquitoes as a food source, like bats, for example.

[John F. Carr]

The proposals I have heard would be species-specific. Kill all the Anopheles gambiae, for example. Most species of mosquitoes are not important disease vectors.

[Malika the Maiz]

Interesting, I didn’t know it was that species specific. Thanks!

[Brett Bellmore]

“Most species of mosquitoes are not important disease vectors.”

Which is why malaria is only a problem in specific areas, although mosquitos are very widespread.

[Dr. Ed 2]

Species of mosquitoes tend to be regional. Like birds are, only moreso because birds can migrate.

REMEMBER THOUGH that the Malaria used to be a major problem in the US. DC was considered a dangerous posting because of Malaria before the swamps were all drained, and Boston — Boston — used to have Malaria outbreaks, as did Middlesex and Essex Counties.

It might have something to do with the fact that there has to be people or animals with Malaria to bite in order to pick it up.

[Kazinski]

And the research bears that out,
“Households with more than five members have a higher likelihood for malaria (AOR: 1.5; 95 % CI: 1.3–2.7)”

https://malariajournal.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s12936-021-03840-w

[bye]

This is in the same class as Climate Change and several other issues. The real question is not should we…it’s do we have better uses for that money and resources, would it even be worth it if it worked, This is a Hillary kind of silliness. Yes, every child in the world should have nice good-fitting shoes. But if doing that takes anything from the efforts that keep them alive at all, it is pure foolishness.

Even more than that volcano of nonsense, Kamala, Hillary acts the saint so she can get her way. Which is usually hateful and evil
I remember Salena Zito’s research on why Hillary lost and it had nothing to do with the popularity of Trump. She just got more and more nasty, more partisan, more against any voter who didn’t agree with her. The Deplorables speech — and I remember this— made me sure that if she were elected she would be my President but I would not be her citizen.

[Krayt]

They do stuff like this already. The US makes weekly flights over Panama, not sure, maybe Cost Rica, dumping a hundred million sterile male mosquitos at the choke point, to stop their crawl up to the US. With glad acquiescence of that country.

You can introduce such, but the real deal will still be there, and their progeny will survive. You will not come close to killing off the species.

Hell, out of billions of mosquitos, there’s probably a few rando females who look on these incels sketchy, and so are passing on their don’t mate with them tendencies, evolving around the effort.

I know some of you don’t believe in evolution. You should go sit over there for this discussion.

[John F. Carr]

Airdrops of irradiated flies are for control of the screwworm Cochliomyia hominivorax. The second part of the name means “man eater.”

Sterile male medflies are also released as needed. If you see a male medfly in California, don’t panic. If you see a female, let somebody know.

[Mr. Bumble]

How do you tell the difference. It being California are there LGB… med flies?

[David Nieporent]

For the record, I never opined on the actual level of the insect population. I mocked Lathrop’s methodology — “there are fewer bugs on my windshield” — and also criticized his finger-pointing at GMO agriculture. (And also for the record, this article blames climate change, not GMO.)

[Mr. Bumble]

“…this article blames climate change,…”
Is there anything it can’t do?

[shawn_dude]

Not commenting on your exchange with Lathrop, but GMO agriculture isn’t entirely innocent here. I have no issues with GMO technology itself and eat some GMO foods without concern, but GMO activities that enable widespread spraying of insecticides on crops certainly contribute to insect population loss. The only GMO crop I actively avoid when grocery shopping are oats as they often contain glyphosate. (Which has nothing to do with insects but rather chemical ripening/drying of the crop.)

[David Nieporent]

Neither you or DN made any effort to do you homework to ascertain the accuracy of my statements – you simply repeated his comments.

You have it backwards; GMO of crops allows less use of pesticide.

[Kazinski]

And more use of herbicide, which is probably why he was confused.

[Stephen Lathrop]

Indoorsman Nieporent is readily confused by outdoor issues. Yes, proponents of GMO agriculture tout reduced pesticide use as a benefit. Yes, in a context limited to not poisoning humans with pesticides, they have a point.

Unfortunately, in an ecological context, all that unravels. Because the reason agro-industrialists use pesticides is to increase crop yields. They want to kill whatever reduces the harvest. And typical GMO methods are far more efficient killers, and less discriminating killers, than are pesticides.

That is what explains the abrupt market transition from pesticides to GMO herbicide-resistant crops. The herbicides do not just kill weeds. The begin with weeds. They end by killing everything in the field which depends for nourishment or reproduction on anything but the desired crop.

When you kill all the unwanted weeds, grasses, etc, you also eliminate everything else. Which means GMO methods are more like systematic sterilization than like pest control. The weeds are gone. The small mammals are gone. The insects are gone. The birds are gone. The reptiles are gone. The larger mammals are gone. Even the survival of fungi will prove doubtful. What is happening to soil microbial organisms is harder to see, but nothing suggests cause for optimism.

Thus, as a purely economic proposition, killing everything but the crop you want is a sensational advantage. As an ecological practice, it is a disaster.

None of that ever got systematic policy consideration. Had someone come to Congress, to seek permission for a proposal annually to exterminate almost every living thing in an area within the United states aggregating acreage equal to the entire geographic extent of about 11 states, would that have just sailed through? If advocates touted a two-fold benefit, to increase crop yields, and to reduce pesticide use, should the mass extermination program have been approved on that basis?

We do not know, because policy approval was never sought. But the nation is now living with ecological results as if approval had happened. I doubt this ends well.

[shawn_dude]

“When you kill all the unwanted weeds, grasses, etc, you also eliminate everything else. Which means GMO methods are more like systematic sterilization than like pest control.”

No, you do not eliminate everything else. When I used Bt powder on my tomatoes, it didn’t kill lady bugs, fire ants, or any other insect that wasn’t a caterpillar or other impacted worm-like critter. When I used Round-up (years ago but no longer), it didn’t kill the larger plants in the yard, or any animals, or anything other than grasses and small weeds (but not crab grass, notably.)

And frankly, you get unintended outcomes from a wide variety of sprayed pesticides with or without GMO crops. Sprays used to take out mosquitoes or wasp nests, for example. You are overstating the impact of pesticides and improperly entangling GMO technology into that impact.

[shawn_dude]

GMO techniques to fight pests (insects, weeds, etc) generally work one of two ways: 1) make the crop immune to a specific anti-pest product or 2) bake the active agent in the anti-pest product into the crop itself.

Examples:
1) Round-Up resistant crops that can be sprayed by glyphosate and not die while the weeds around them do. This doesn’t result in less spraying.

2) Bt corn is a GMO corn with the insecticidal proteins from Bacillus thuringiensis incorporated into the plant which makes the plant itself toxic to insects.

The goal is to allow for less use of applied pesticides which saves time and money and presumably avoids the issue of the spray floating outside of the target zone. However, splicing the pesticide’s active properties into the plant itself is still a use of the pesticide in a certain sense. For example, the pollen from Bt corn is itself a pesticide and when it’s blown onto milkweed it’s shown to kill Monarch butterfly caterpillars.

Bt corn, IMHO, is a good use of GMO but it does not represent a reduction in pesticide use but rather a new way to use it. It still has some of the downside effects of sprayed pesticides.

Side note: your quote is not from me. Not sure why you included that.

[shawn_dude]

Too late to edit: “makes the plant itself toxic to insects.” To clarify, Bt doen’t impact all insects but only a narrow band of them that have a caterpillar-like larval form (lepidopterans, coleopterans, and some flies.)

[Noscitur a sociis]

Playing the hit? Is it old timers week already?
Now do the monkey selfie!

[Stephen Lathrop]

Another guy doing a Nieporent. Isn’t this your third pointless reiteration? Or have I missed some?

You lack Nieporent’s perspicacity to understand I was not an acknowledged expert in the subject he chose to critique me on. I am a long-standing professional expert in photographic technique. Making all or part of my living with cameras began for me in the 1970s, and never let up. My fine art images have been sold and published world-wide.

Why is it so important to you to believe in the monkey selfie fraud? The equipment used to make that picture was expressly designed to prevent the optical result the guy claimed happened by accident. To anyone familiar with camera optics, it was not a close call. I explained why at the time.

Equipment which hit the market years later could have done it, but in any world without time travel, that remains irrelevant.

[Don Nico]

Stephen,
While it is irrelevant to this thread, as a dedicated photographer who detests the word “shot” when applied to photographic images, I am interested to know what you would cite as the hallmarks of fine art photography as compared/contrasted with high quality sports, wildlife, architectural, etc. photography.

[ducksalad]

the hallmarks of fine art photography as compared/contrasted with high quality sports, wildlife, architectural, etc. photography.

If the viewer’s first impression is “what a beautiful leap/ocelot/statue” then it’s high quality sports, wildlife, architectural, etc. photography.

If the viewer’s first impression is “that’s an,,,,umm… interesting way to use the camera” then it’s fine art photography.

[Don Nico]

I disagree with you, but I am much more interested in Stephen’s view as he says he has earned his living through photography.

I claim that good photographs are made not taken. The craft is in the printmaking or its digital analogue. Think Edward Weston or Ansel Adams or Joseph Karsh.
As Cartier-Bresson said,”To take a photograph is to align the head, the eye and the heart. It’s a way of life.”

[ducksalad]

I agree and think it’s what I said, stated more respectfully.

Fine art is focused the artistry, rather than the subject matter.

[bernard11]

A friend draws the distinction differently.

It’s art if it costs more to buy than to frame.

[bernard11]

I claim that good photographs are made not taken.

I think few serious photographers would disagree with this. (I am a photographer myself, both serious and definitely amateur.)

The craft is in the printmaking or its digital analogue. Think Edward Weston or Ansel Adams or Joseph Karsh.

No. The craft is in both. Adams, using a musical analogy, called the negative the score and the print the performance. Still, many photographers, especially photo-journalist types, do not print all or most of their images. See, for example, this discussion of Cartier-Bresson.

[Don Nico]

I’d say there is craft in both.
Many years ago I had a friend who was a highly recognized war photographer often found that the craft was getting to the front getting the images and getting back alive. To be sure, he took hundreds of photographs for every one that was actually used or even useful.
With respect to Adams analogy, the score is only art to the the musician or scholar; it is the performance that makes the art live.

[Stephen Lathrop]

Nico — My goodness. A hard question. The mere start of an article to do it justice would require a lot of space from one of the popular photography journals.

About fine art photography, I can only tell you what I strive for. Others attempting art will not all agree with me, or with each other.

What I try to make is an image which is abidingly fascinating. That seems a characteristic which art can rely upon, when skills and conditions permit its creation, which is not often.

Many technically superb photographic images also feature attention-riveting content, but may not get over that bar. Let initial visual interest be as strong as it may, if you cannot live with the image in constant proximity, while considering it anew, and discovering anew, more-or-less perpetually, then I consider that an artistic shortcoming.

Images which succeed artistically for me tend to be ones where every square centimeter contributes to a graphically unified whole. Quite often, distribution of natural light provides organizing principle. Those images are replete with detail everywhere, and the details invite curiosity on their own. The visual theme will transmit an emotional charge, but not necessarily an unalloyed, uncomplicated, or domineering one.

As for your other categories, I have done them all, and been paid to make images of those sorts. They are separate sub-crafts. To do them well requires separate talents, learned skills, and various types of equipment mastery. Sports and wildlife tend to share a need for longer lenses. Sports puts a premium on split-second work; wildlife rewards patient work. Both require a lot of travel, and a vigorous personal constitution to excel. The best images in each genre become famous genre classics, or iconic, but rarely become abidingly fascinating.

My own photographic hobby is bird photography, especially including birds in flight. I have photographed hundreds of species. For a few striking species I own the best images I have ever seen. There is no money in it. Except for a few dedicated wildlife photographers, on the lookout for increasingly rare assignments, wildlife photography looks like an economic dead end. Currently, wildlife photography seems more enabled by buying the best of an assortment of especially capable, especially expensive equipment, than by the wildlife knowledge and stalking skills which formerly were indispensable. Turns out, those skills can still pay off, but for amateurs who can afford it, the new equipment routinely delivers formerly impossible images.

Architectural photography is a trade for specialists. To excel consistently, they need mastery of perspective controlling lens adjustments, and a battery of expensive lenses of that sort. Additionally, indoor architectural photography is all about designing with artificial light sources, and often becomes a game of hiding lights to deliver visual effects which make it look like no lights were needed. Skills to do that can be highly rewarded, if you can round up the clients who need them.

Thanks for asking. As a reward I will share reference to an earlier photographic artist, a specialist in railroad photography at the end of the steam age. His name was O. Winston Link. To get a glimpse of his vision, Google: The Birmingham Special Gets the Highball at Rural Retreat, Virginia.

A favorite of mine, but many of his other images have also been seen by too few. I just read that Link’s famous, “Hot Shot Eastbound,” got parodied on The Simpsons, so maybe folks have noticed his work on that account. If you have not seen it, it is another one to take a look at. Plus a bunch of others.

[Don Nico]

Stephen,
Thank you for your reply. I have a strong interest in making large panorama landscapes prints of the 2’x4′ scale. Those prints live on our walls; for our family they pass the test that you describe. These large images often require careful stitching of several multiple images and varying the white balance across the image. But my passion is B&W photography in natural light with an approach similar to using the Adams zone system.
I’ve tried my hand at sports photography during Boston marathons. For me, that is hard; I don’t have the fast reflexes required using a 5 fps camera. Birds are nearly impossible for me. If you can’t see the bird, you cannot photograph it.

I do fuss over prints as I am of the school that the best images are made in the darkroom.
Again, thanks for your long answer.

[Jmaie]

There is a photographer, can’t remember his name, who had a shop selling prints in the Salt Lake City airport of all places. I was astounded by his product – one was a crystal clear 15″x36″ print of only part of an eagle’s head. A 1″x3″ section, blown up 15x.

Another photo was of a bear popping up out of a lake at sunrise. Water still streaming from his/hers chin hair. Only from the neck up. This one the head was half life-sized. But taken from far away so still pretty awesome…

[Stephen Lathrop]

Nico, my fine art images are almost all either sea-related images, or actual seascapes. My typical print size uses an image area 45-inches wide, with a notably wider frame size. Moving waves and unstable light conditions tend to preclude stitching images.

So I use a 45-megapixel Canon 35 millimeter camera, tilt/shift lenses with focal lengths typically longer than 50mm, and I wait patiently for the most effectively balanced natural light conditions. I am on the lookout for bright-enough, diffused-enough light to distinguish the subtlest gradations in tone. That shows the best detail.

The longer focal lengths enhance detail.

Focal plane tilts redistribute useful depth of field, to extend a mild-telephoto focal plane in sharp focus, from a few feet in front of the camera, to the horizon.

Imagine an image, shot from a beach, showing details on the surfaces of the nearest sand grains, and extending to resolve rigging details on a sailboat a mile or two offshore. That is a technical challenge which can sometimes be accomplished. It can be used as basis for a nearly imperceptible kind of photo-realistic surrealism—an image made in a natural-looking way, to disclose a scene which the sharpest eye could never perceive.

Thus, with the right light, focal-length, and tilt advantages all leveraging each other, the 45 megapixel, 35 mm format, shot off a tripod, can deliver print detail to rival the best Ansel Adams prints made by developing negatives from an 8×10 view camera. I joke to bystanders that I intend to read the time on the sailors’ watches.

To further improve the best use of my time, I have learned to refer online to an astronomer’s sky-condition prediction site: cleardarksky.com. Turns out it is as helpful to predict daytime light conditions as to guide night-time star viewing. It shows hour-by-hour sky conditions, with locally detailed cloud conditions, and, crucially, atmospheric, “seeing,” indexed to thousands of geographic sites across the nation. An excellent resource to avoid wasting time and expense to go to a place where local conditions might thwart good results.

Of course, that much technical capacity makes the composition problem, and hence the artistic challenge, harder, not easier. An image with everything sharp, and the smallest expected details resolved, puts an almost unlimited number of design stumbling blocks in view. No point discussing all the ways that can go wrong.

With good luck, and near-daily image capture efforts, I feel lucky to get two or three artistically successful images a year. Five in a year would be a bonanza.

I wish you the best. It’s a lovely way to spend your time.

[Noscitur a sociis]

Hahaha! There it is!

[Frank Drackman]

Was in North Dakota a few weeks ago, that’s where all the Mosquitos are.

[Mr. Bumble]

Guess who testified before the Senate yesterday with regard to judges gone wild, with TROs and nationwide injunctions?
(Hint initials are JB).
At the same hearing watch Senator John Kennedy (R-LA)
rip Prof. Kate Shaw a new one.
https://rumble.com/v6u9qfp-john-kennedy-takes-law-professor-to-task-for-calling-conservative-supreme-c.html

[Dr. Ed 2]

Do all estates have to go through probate court or is there an exemption for under a certain level? That’s what’s being implied in a lot of ads I am hearing — and then how do you distribute the four figures that’s in a bank account?

Or is this all a big scam?

[John F. Carr]

There are simplified procedures in some states for small estates. I don’t know how the process works.

A bank account can be made payable to a specific person on death of the account holder, bypassing probate.

[Frank Drackman]

Sounds complicated, maybe you should consult an Attorney.

[Dr. Ed 2]

It was an attorney who created this mess. Two different trusts and a will. Who bills to listen to him talk about Indian motorcycles. Grrrr….

[jb]

AIUI, this varies wildly from state to state.

[Don Nico]

Not necessarily. It depends on the size, the nature of the ownership (are all the assets already jointly held with the survivors or held in a trust-details matter here too)

[Dr. Ed 2]

Elon Musk — Trump’s Big Bill will bankrupt the country.
This is a MAJOR split with Trump — and lifts debt ceiling by 5 TRILLION dollars.

[Martinned]

Yesterday on Marginal Revolution: https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2025/06/sentence-of-the-day-11.html

FT: Analysis by Torsten Sløk, chief economist at Apollo, suggested that US government credit default swap spreads — which reflect the cost of protecting a loan against default — are trading at levels similar to Greece and Italy.

Sounds like an excellent time for a massive tax cut!

[Dr. Ed 2]

No tax on tips is asinine — the biggest problem in the restaurant industry right now is the shortage of help in the “back of the house” (e.g. cooks) where people are not tipped. Waitresses make good money — they work for it, but so do UPS drivers.

So if your highest paid staff also don’t have to pay taxes while your lower paid staff do, what is that going to do?

Likewise no tax on overtime when salaried people routinely work 60-70 hours a week without being paid it, they already are earning less per hour and now have to pay taxes while hourly don’t?

This sort of thing never ends well….

[Martinned]

That’s all peanuts (and simply evidence of terrible US labour laws). Headline rates on big ticket taxes will simply have to come up.

(Which is, incidentally, also the other way to combat inflation, other than the Fed increasing interest rates.)

[John F. Carr]

Is the headline rate the advertised rate that big taxpayers don’t really pay? The 1980s tax reform lowered the theoretical tax rate while removing exceptions that made the real tax rate much lower. We need another tax reform along the same lines.

[Joe_dallas]

the 2017 tax act had similar improvement in fairness (though a lot of bad provisions along with it).

Three of the best fairness provisions were
A – increase in standard deduction
B – large increase in the AMT exemption
C – $10k cap on SALT

The $10k cap on salt has been overly criticized. Due to the large increase in the AMT exemption, the $10k cap often had a very trivial impact on total tax paid.

[Joe_dallas]

JC – I agree that tax reform is warranted. The complexity of the tax code is driven by several factors, A – the need to generate government revenue, B – the complexity of business operations and C – currying favors among various interest groups

[Frank Drackman]

OK Mr. Pink, you convinced me, give me back my $5

[Kazinski]

i don’t know what kind of restaurants you are familiar with but at least in the West Coast tips are shared with the back of the house too.

But that may be because most west coast states don’t have a reduced minimum wage for tipped employees.

[PaulS]

I find the automatic tips that are added to pay the “back of the house” pretty annoying – but with no taxes on tips they make alot of sense. I think they will actually go up (higher %). Beyond that the restaurant (or other places that will now add tipping) don’t pay FICA, unemployment, workers comp etc on tips. Big savings. Automatic tipping will be the wave of the future – soon it will be part of the price for self service gas…..

[Michael P]

It sounds like an excellent time to reform our bloated entitlement spending.

A simpler tax system with fewer exceptions and carve outs would be nice, but the current structural problem in the US budget is entitlement spending, not revenue.

[Malika the Maiz]

If only Mikie P’s beloved Mad King had not said entitlements (and defense) are off the table! That guy has let him down more almost as much as his wife!

[jb]

Revenue and spending are both problems, and the governing party seems primarily interested in ignoring one and making the other a lot worse.

That’s been par for the course for several decades now, though. No one is serious about controlling spending, and only the Democrats are serious about even trying to pay for it.

[Michael P]

https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/FYFRGDA188S says you can’t reasonably expect more revenue for the federal government. (Democrats are big on being unreasonable, of course.)

[jb]

Eh. You’re not going to 25% of GDP, but 18-20% is probably reasonable.

[Michael P]

For a quarter, maybe. The times federal revenue went above 18% GDP, there were immediate recessions where it then dropped to about 15%.

[jb]

You know each data point on that chart is a year, right?

More generally, “immediately” doesn’t mean what you seem to think it means. What usually happens is that Democrats do the hard work of passing responsible tax plans, Republicans run on tax cuts and spending cuts, do in fact cut taxes but don’t cut spending and also mismanage the economy into the next recession. (Credit to George HW Bush for being the exception to this general trend.) I’m not saying that tax cuts cause recessions, but none of the recent recessions started shortly after tax increases.

[darkknight9]

What Gretzky is to hockey, Hakuhō Shō is to Sumo.
The JSA did him dirty stringing him along and he has had enough. Zero argument, the greatest Sumo rikishi of all time has given back his elder stock and dropped the Miyagino moniker and left the Japan Sumo Association.
Saying they were “talking about” reinstating his beya after the November basho, he would have been left as a junior coach to one of his longtime rivals who is now the Isegehama stablemaster after his master’s retirement.

I wish him the best, and for those who follow you know the JSA has had it out for him for years. Stubborn enough to let the greatest world ambassador for your sport walk away is shameful for the elders. Good luck to Hakuho. He has many amazing years ahead of him.
https://www.japantimes.co.jp/sports/2025/06/02/sumo/hakuho-to-leave-jsa/

[Malika the Maiz]

It’s interesting that for years sumo has been dominated by non-Japanese athletes. That means there’s a lot riding on the recently named Yokozuna.

[Don Nico]

Indeed, Mongolia has produced a string of ozeki and yokozuna.
I have high hopes for Onosato. For one so young, he is doubly impressive.
Of course he still has much to learn. But he seems to hav.e the potential to rival Hakuho

[Don Nico]

Thank you for the post. I count myself lucky to have been able to watch the greatest rikishi of all time perform. Hakuho was a true master. His departure from the JSA diminishes the sport.

[dwb68]

Interest payments take up 25% of the federal budget.

Deficits are unsustainable. Spending has to come down. If not, taxes (especially that ornery inflation tax) will close the gap. Now is the time to close the deficit, while the economy is reasonably strong and inflation is still too high.

Democrats are willing to raise taxes, which is inevitable unless the deficit closes. We should all hold Republicans responsible for the inevitable tax hike.

[ThePublius]

“…while the economy is reasonably strong and inflation is still too high.” [emphasis mine]

What?

“US Inflation Rate is at 2.31%, compared to 2.39% last month and 3.36% last year. This is lower than the long term average of 3.28%.”

[dwb68]

1.5% would be better and would allow the Fed to lower rates. But you’re partly right: Last year was a better time to do it!

[Mr. Bumble]

0% would be better yet.

[Martinned]

No it wouldn’t. 0% average inflation would mean deflation on about half of the products in the basket, which would be very bad.

[Mr. Bumble]

0% as a target. Why should some deflation be “very bad”?
What is the positive side of inflation?

[Krayt]

“No inflation” is bad if you borrow money, and your government business model relies on never paying it back, just the interest as it decreases in value over decades.

It’s useful to get elected, to be corrupt, the whole point of getting elected, and so this meme patter evolved justifying massive chronic borrowing, to enbiggen the money poured out to get elected.

The People once realized they, themselves, were ultimately the problem, but the corruption class would not let them send out a balanced budget amendment because it would definitely have passed.

These are the same corrupt frauds who say things like the amendment process is too difficult, and they, being specialists at gleaning what The People Really Want, need to do away with it.

[bernard11]

Deflation is bad because it leads to economic stagnation or worse.

Who is going to invest in expanding a factory, or hire more workers, if the price of outputs sold in December is going down relative to the cost of inputs bought in May.

Its a long, long way from May to December, especially with prices dropping the whole time.

[bye]

There’s always what I thought Biden would eventually get to
Negative bank interest rates. His administratin was riddled with MMT fans. This was maybe inevitable
the central banks of Switzerland, Sweden, and Japan have all implemented negative interest rate policies

[Brett Bellmore]

He really tried with Saule Omarova, but it blew up in his face when people looked at her CV.

[David Nieporent]

Still just a loony conspiracy theory from someone who didn’t read what she wrote.

[Brett Bellmore]

Please. It is at worse a loony conspiracy theory from someone who DID read what she wrote. Just to make sure it was being accurately described, and it was.

[Michael P]

The standard target for inflation is 2%. Trump has been moving things in the right direction, but they’re not quite at the target level yet.

https://www.federalreserve.gov/economy-at-a-glance-inflation-pce.htm

[Sarcastr0]

‘We are not quite as low as the standard target’ seems not up to the drama of the OP.

[Michael P]

Inflation was a small factor in the OP. Paying 25% of revenue towards interest indicates serious fiscal illness. (The numbers I found don’t line up with interest being 25% of all federal spending. https://www.pgpf.org/programs-and-projects/fiscal-policy/monthly-interest-tracker-national-debt/ says interest is more like 18% of revenue or 16% of spending, both of which are still much too high.)

[Malika the Maiz]

Looks like he’s riding a trend started in the Biden years.

https://www.usinflationcalculator.com/inflation/current-inflation-rates/

[Kazinski]

The big drop in inflation came in 2023, when the Feds rate hikes started kicking in, while the Democrats lost the House and couldn’t get anymore spending bills through.

Maybe gridlock is our best political alignment.

Although if the Dems were in charge of the House now we’d be guaranteed a recession as the 2017 tax cuts expired and there would be a huge middle class tax hike.

[Malika the Maiz]

March 16, 2022: 0.25–0.50%
May 4, 2022: 0.75–1.00%
June 15, 2022: 1.50–1.75%
July 27, 2022: 2.25–2.50%
September 21, 2022: 3.00–3.25%
November 2, 2022: 3.75–4.00%
December 14, 2022: 4.25–4.50%
February 1, 2023: 4.50–4.75%
March 22, 2023: 4.75–5.00%
May 3, 2023: 5.00–5.25%
July 26, 2023: 5.25–5.50%

[Kazinski]

What’s that, the fed rates I presume.

I think that well supports my statement that the effect of the fed rate cuts started kicking in in 2023, there is definitely a lag from when they raising rates until they start significantly effecting behavior. Which is of course why the fed kept raising them until the middle of 2023 then waited 13 months to let it sort out.

[shawn_dude]

That was a feature of the GOP-passed tax-cut for the rich bill, right? the delayed impact was needed to get the right budget numbers during Trump’s first term. All he’s done this time is kick that can down the road while adding an additional 2.5T to the deficit. The Dems might have actually fixed this by returning taxes to pre-Trump levels where shifting the cost of the handout for the rich wasn’t borne by the middle class.

[dwb68]

Trump has nothing to do with it. The Fed raising rates over the last two years has brought down inflation.

[Malika the Maiz]

His deregulation, especially in energy, might help, but would likely be wiped out by his deporting cheap labor and tariff taxes.

[dwb68]

California is in a budget mess because of all the illegal immigrants on Medi-Cal. “Cheap Labor” is fine but needs something to do, like build houses, or mine rare earth elements and make electric motors for vehicles. Right now we are a hostage to China because they control 85% of the rare earth magnet market. Car, auto, and other goods depend on these so a lack of magnets basically shuts down production.

When California gets rid of all the progressive baloney that prevents housing construction and mining… I will take the Democrats seriously about economics.

[Malika the Maiz]

Illegals make up a shit ton of workers in the housing market.

[dwb68]

If only there was a robust new construction housing market in California and New York!

[Malika the Maiz]

What does that have to do with anything? Deporting the cheap labor in the states that do have robust housing markets is going to increase labor costs and hence prices.

[Dr. Ed 2]

Not as much as you might think — the true costs of “cheap” labor are shifted but still paid.

[jb]

https://www.nationalmortgagenews.com/list/20-states-with-the-most-new-construction-approvals

Probably not as high as they should be, but c’mon.

[Kazinski]

California, by far the most populous state, and with the largest housing shortage, also by far, is in a distant 3rd place in new construction and regressing.

But the real eye opener is NY, in 8th place, but they had to increase their permits by 80% in a single year to get there. Wow, that’s nuts.

[jb]

So you think that translates into no “robust new construction housing market” in either state?

I agree that many blue states need to be a lot better at creating new housing, but it’s bizarre to pretend that no one is building houses there.

[Kazinski]

I think that amounts to falling further behind, at least in California. California has the largest housing deficit in the country at needing over 800,000 new homes to meet current demand.

The stat you provided showed Californi at 59,263 new housing starts units for 2024 as of July. Ok so double that and say its 120k.

So in 7 years they can erase the current backlog which will probably at least double by then. 59k new starts isn’t even treading water, and its down 9% from the previous year.

And sure a lot of that is high interest rates, but I am afraid the current rates are going to be the new normal for awhile. The 2012-2022 mortgage rates were historical lows, our current rates are right around the historical average since 1950.

[Brett Bellmore]

I oppose the ‘inevitable’ tax hike, because it won’t close the deficit, it will just result in the deficit happening at a higher level of spending.

Until we put in some structural provision to stop them from spending the new revenue and then borrowing anyway, you simply cannot balance the budget by taxation.

[apedad]

Them?

You describe members of Congress as some foreign entity.

And while there are some (very) long-term Senators and Representatives, there is also significant turnover.

“[W]hen the current Congress convened in January 2021, 72% of House members and 65% of senators were new since the start of the 111th Congress in January 2009 – what we call the ’12-year turnover rate.’”

Plus there’s the frequent flipping of Senate/House leadership.

The problem is you, your neighbors, family, friends, fellow Conspirators, etc., wanting stuff but unwilling to pay.

The only fix is to pass a balanced budget amendment which would force Congress to always pass a balanced budget.

https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2022/06/09/some-members-of-congress-have-been-there-for-decades-but-seats-typically-change-hands-more-frequently/

[ThePublius]

“You describe members of Congress as some foreign entity.”

No, he didn’t! He simply used a pronoun to refer to members of Congress.

Geez.

[Sarcastr0]

“The problem is you, your neighbors, family, friends, fellow Conspirators, etc., wanting stuff but unwilling to pay.”

Brett wants strong border protections, broad persecution of ze libs in law firms and schools and universities and from the Biden Admin, federal policing of speech in schools and of immigrants, tax cuts, etc. etc.

He wants all these things to be done with skeleton resources and with a small civil service vetted for loyalty not merit.

He is a reactionary, not a serious person with a serious idea of how this country should be.

Kind of reminds me of latter day Marx, who hatted bureaucracies while espousing a government that required them.

[Sarcastr0]

Marx also hated bureaucracies, but it wouldn’t’ surprise me if he hatted them too.

[Brett Bellmore]

Everybody wants stuff that they don’t have to pay for. That’s why it’s so bloody important that people be required to pay for things!

I want borrowing to be taken off the table for all but existential emergencies, so that different spending proposals have to compete against each other for pieces of a limited pie.

The case for the federal government to be borrowing outside of genuine emergencies like existential war is essentially nonexistent. ALL our expenses are small enough compared to cash flow that we should never be borrowing.

[Malika the Maiz]

It is sad that I can’t recall the Democrats talking about how much money goes to paying the interest alone since Jerry Brown’s 92 run and few Republicans do too.

[Brett Bellmore]

We went straight from “It’s not urgent, we can do something about it later.” to “It’s too late to do anything about it, so let’s party until it all comes crashing down.” without ever passing through “Welp, guess we better bite the bullet and get things under control.”

That’s not quite true, though. In 1982, Reagan supported a balanced budget amendment. It passed the Senate, fell 7 votes short in the House. It’s said that it only passed the Senate BECAUSE it was known the House would defeat it…

The Senate almost passed such an amendment in ’94. In 1995, as part of Gingrich’s “Contract with America”, such an amendment passed the House, and then narrowly failed in the Senate.

It was just theater, though; Every time a Senator changed their mind and switched to supporting the amendment, another Senator who had voted for it the year before changed their vote and voted against it.

That’s been the general trend: Congress stage manages votes on the Balanced budget amendment to make sure they fail.

I think the only way it’s happening is via constitutional convention. Thankfully, calling that only requires a majority in each house, not a supermajority. Then it’s entirely out of Congress’ hands.

[dwb68]

A Constitutional Convention is never going to happen. I wouldn’t support it because it couldn’t be limited to a single subject.

[Brett Bellmore]

If it could be limited to a single subject, they’d deliberately limit it to the point where it wouldn’t be worth having.

It still takes the same number of states to ratify an amendment from a con-con, as it does if Congress originates, so stop being afraid.

[dwb68]

The first thing they’d “compromise” is the 2nd amendment, and State legislatures are no friend to the 2nd. FL and TX both are always a struggle. FL passed a ban on 18-21 yd olds buying guns which is likely to get struck. SC I could not carry as a nonresident until recently, and getting constitutional carry was like pulling teeth.

I have no doubt we could get an AWB codified as a compromise because not even republicans are pro-gun enough to accept scary black “short barreled” rifles

So… hell to the no.

[Commenter_XY]

Agree, everything gets put on the table in the CC. Don’t think that is very smart right now. Might need to later with AI.

[grb]

Brett Bellmore : “In 1982, Reagan supported a balanced budget amendment.”

A true Bellmorian special! Reagan introduced massive deficits to peacetime America. He exploded the deficit using an “economic theory” that was a crude silly nonsense as justification . One of my memories from the period was the annual battle between White House “rosy scenario” budget projections and the CBO. Guess who was always proved right, year after year? Of course people claim Reagan demanded spending cuts to go with his humongous tax cuts, but you don’t see that if you compare the White House budget proposal numbers with what Congress passed. There was some difference (about 10 billion on average) but it was mostly noise.

To a serious budget hawk, Reagan is where the train went off the rails. But Brett’s never serious on this topic, not even once. A few cartoon theatrics and – presto! – Reagan has plausible deniability. It’s like Brett’s own case, where he ALWAYS votes for whichever presidential candidate promises him the most new federal debt. I sometimes think his candidate policy checklist is blank but for that.

But – hey – Brett makes a pretty little speech how debt is very, very bad and everything is magically put to right. Try talking about the measures needed to tame the budget and watch him run for the hills.

[bernard11]

Right. The whole “supply-side” business was nonsense on stilts as was subsequently proven again in some states – notably Kansas – intended to justify tax cuts.

I note also that Brett has not peeped about the huge tax cuts in Trump’s Big Bullshit Bill.

So no, he’s not serious about the deficit. It’s just a stick to swing at his many perceived enemies.

[Jmaie]

“Reagan introduced massive deficits to peacetime America”

He had help…Dems controlled the house throughout both his terms and the senate the last term…

[grb]

Jmaie : “He had help…Dems controlled the house throughout both his terms and the senate the last term…”

Absolutely true. But the budgetary policy of the United States didn’t radically change because Congress had a sudden new idea. Presidents set the agenda, particularly at the beginning of their term. Add an electoral margin of 489 to 49 and the agenda-setting goes off the charts. Strangely enough, RR still only got 50.7% of the vote, which made his victory exceptionally broad but not deep.

(none of that is meant to absolve Congress of irresponsibility or cowardice. But a responsible and brave Congress is pretty much the ultimate oxymoron)

[bernard11]

The case for the federal government to be borrowing outside of genuine emergencies like existential war is essentially nonexistent.

Ridiculous on a number of accounts, not least enforcement.

Here’s the thing, Brett. Fiscal policy works.

you simply cannot balance the budget by taxation.

Of course you can.

You are just parroting conservative mythology.

[Brett Bellmore]

“Fiscal policy works.”

So does snorting cocaine, but how many people have the self control to use it as just an occasional stimulant in emergencies? Demonstrably, the abuse potential of fiscal policy is so high, it should be prohibited, because the government is incapable of not abusing it.

” you simply cannot balance the budget by taxation.

Of course you can. ”

Look, for essentially my entire life, the federal government has been running a deficit. Sure, for a very few years they ran a primary surplus, but even in those years the national debt, calculated in the way that doesn’t get you criminal charges in the private sector, didn’t materially decline.

And for almost all of that time, all they would have needed to do to achieve a balanced budget was to stop increasing spending for a few years. Not cut, just freeze for a few years. Because revenue was trending up that whole while.

And yet, it didn’t happen.

They raised SS taxes back in the Reagan years, on the premise that the debt would be paid down with the extra money, leaving the government in a better position for when the SS cash flow turned negative. They spent the extra money and kept borrowing.

The fact is, as demonstrated by a lifetime of history, the federal government does not have the discipline to refrain from spending increased revenues. Anybody who WOULD exhibit such discipline underbids for votes, and gets replaced by somebody who would borrow to spend more. It’s THE classic failure mode of democracy: Once you can get away with borrowing to buy votes, nobody can refrain, and hope to remain in office.

So the discipline needs to be IMPOSED. The option of borrowing needs to be made harder to exercise, a lot harder. Because what can’t go on won’t go on, and as you can see from those curves I linked to above, both debt and deficit are climbing exponentially. Because at this point we are literally borrowing to make our interest payments!

So it doesn’t MATTER that, in theory, a rational level of borrowing would be manageable. It doesn’t MATTER that fiscal policy works. A crack head can’t take just one hit, and then walk away, and our government is addicted to borrowing. It’s cold turkey or nothing.

[Mr. Bumble]

Hahahahaha.
Balanced budget amendment. The clowns haven’t even passed a budget in decades, just continuing resolutions.

[Martinned]

Are the continuing resolutions that Congress does pass different from “a budget” in any meaningful way?

[Mr. Bumble]

Yes.

[Malika the Maiz]

How?

[Mr. Bumble]

Get back when you’re serious.

[Malika the Maiz]

Every accusation…!

[Mr. Bumble]

Happy, shithead.
“The U.S. government’s method for deciding how to spend taxpayer money, known as the appropriations process, directly impacts countless services Americans rely on daily. This process determines funding for everything from national defense and infrastructure to healthcare research and environmental protection.

Two primary mechanisms determine funding for government activities: the standard “regular appropriations” process (the ideal) and the increasingly common temporary measure known as “continuing resolutions” (CRs).

Understanding these two funding pathways reveals an inherent tension in the budget process—a constant struggle between orderly, planned governance and the political realities that often obstruct timely agreements.

The detailed, multi-stage nature of regular appropriations reflects a system designed for thorough planning and comprehensive debate. Conversely, the development and increasing use of CRs as a “stopgap” measure implicitly acknowledges that this ideal process frequently falters. This duality is not accidental but a systemic adaptation to the intricate challenges of governing within a diverse democracy.”
https://govfacts.org/explainer/understanding-continuing-resolutions-vs-regular-appropriations/

[Malika the Maiz]

It’s just that one is more long term planned.

[David Nieporent]

There is a difference between CRs and standard appropriations, but the “budget” isn’t either of those things. The budget is just a blueprint; it’s not where the actual money is appropriated.

[dwb68]

I would add: tax hikes generally increase revenue far less than expected because people change their behavior to avoid them, usually in unexpected ways (like not working/retiring). We really need to cut the deficit by pushing more spending to the states.

[Martinned]

“expected” by who? Sensible countries have independent advisors who analyse the likely tax revenues under different scenarios, so that the legislature can make an informed decision. Doesn’t the US have such a thing?

[Brett Bellmore]

In theory, but they’re required to use unrealistic assumptions that Congress has mandated, such as tax avoidance not being a thing.

[bernard11]

The CBO is indeed so mandated, a foolish aspect of our budget process.

This also leads to assumptions like,

“This increase or cut will only last nine years, and in the tenth year we will revert to the current rules.”

No one expects that to happen, and it never does. Still, there are those outside government who try to do more accurate work.

[Martinned]

…which is why I said “independent”. Of course I’m aware that the Project 2025 ideal is no independence for anything ever.

[Dr. Ed 2]

The problem with pushing the spending to the states is twofold — not all states are equally wealthy and you don’t want to see the states trying to raise money off each other.

[Martinned]

And 3. that leads to a race to the bottom, where states compete to set the lowest tax rates, and public services suffer as a result.

[bernard11]

tax hikes generally increase revenue far less than expected because people change their behavior to avoid them, usually in unexpected ways (like not working/retiring).

I don’t think it’s fair to say “less than expected.” Yes, politicians and others too often make claims based on an assumed linear response, But this is silly, as you say.

The fact is that labor markets are, and have been for decades, a major topic of study and research by economists, and these effects are well-known. So no knowledgeable person trying to project the revenue effect of a tax hike would ignore them.

[Sarcastr0]

That you don’t consider that taxes and spending are both equal instruments to address the deficit shows you’re not serious.

You’re using debt as an instrument to try and get your unpopular policy preferences instantiated.

Another tell is that you don’t understand the specific economic issues that sovereign debt includes, and just appeal to ‘number big.’

[Riva]

Tax cuts are revenue enhancing. The government will take in more money. Deficits and debt will decline. The CBO estimates blindly and consistently ignore this, among other factors. Although I would like more cuts as well. A no brainer should be everything green new deal and other low hanging democrat wastes.

[Malika the Maiz]

“An analysis of the tax cuts by Harvard’s Gabriel Chodorow-Reich, Princeton’s Owen Zidar, and Chicago Booth’s Eric Zwick finds that the TCJA has boosted investment, as well as wages and economic activity—but not nearly enough to make up for substantial losses in corporate tax revenues that have increased the deficit.”
https://www.chicagobooth.edu/review/trump-tax-cuts-benefits-outweighed-lost-revenue

[Riva]

Well that must be true. Economists are never wrong. Like global warming models, sometimes one has to manipulate the data to get at the preferred result.

[Malika the Maiz]

They tend to know more about economics than bots on comment sections. And unlike bot they have data and analysis.

[Riva]

Since it appears your medication has run out and we’re back to some infantile grade school insults, this exchange will now conclude.

[Malika the Maiz]

Bot not programmed to respond I see.

[dwb68]

This has always been a talking point but has literally never been true. Tax cuts reduce revenue.

[Riva]

Actually quite the opposite, if one cares about those things we call facts. Wasn’t the case for Reagan. Wasn’t the case for Trump. I don’t think “always “ means what you think it means.

[Malika the Maiz]

It was slightly up in 18 and down in 20.

https://www.statista.com/statistics/200405/receipts-of-the-us-government-since-fiscal-year-2000/

[Riva]

See above comments and f off. You’ve forfeited the right to have any kind of an adult level exchange of views. It’s absolutely pointless. You’re just former twitter trash looking for a new home.

[Malika the Maiz]

Bot programmed to rein feelings (if not intelligence).

[dwb68]

https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/FYFRGDA188S

Federal Receipts as Percent of Gross Domestic Product (FYFRGDA188S)

The argument that tax cuts increase revenue assumes that growth will pick up to compensate for the assumed reduction in revenue. It never does. Federal tax receipts as a percent of GDP is remarkably stable despite the major changes in tax policy over the last 30 years. The only years we had a surplus was under Clinton, mostly due to the tax hikes by his predecessor. Bush II cut taxes, revenue went down (as a % of GDP, as expected)

[Riva]

No the argument is based on data that shows government revenue increased as tax rates declined. Rather undeniable. Tax revenue boomed under Reagan and Trump.

[Josh R]

Tax revenue as a % of GDP before and after the Reagan tax cut:

1981: 19.1% (baseline year before tax cuts)
1982: 18.6%
1983: 17.0%
1984: 16.9%
1985: 17.2%

Tax revenues would have been much higher without the tax cut.

[Mr. Bumble]

Now do it in dollars.

[Malika the Maiz]

I did that above, ya goof

[Josh R]

Inflation-adjusted dollars (to 2017):

1981: 1546 billion
1982: 1479
1983: 1369
1984: 1448

Nonetheless, inflation-adjusted dollars is not the correct methodology to asses the impact on the debt. You don’t compare to the dollar baseline. You compare to what revenue would have been without the tax cut, which is why % of GDP is used.

[Riva]

This is an asinine analysis. That tax revenue as a percentage of GDP declines in no way means that tax revenue has declined in real terms. It just means that tax revenue is a smaller factor in the overall economy. Actually a good thing.

[Malika the Maiz]

lol, bot malfunctioning!

Inflation-adjusted dollars (to 2017)

[Josh R]

It means revenue would have been higher without the tax cut than with the tax cut, and thus the debt lower without the tax cut than with the tax cut.

[David Nieporent]

Nonetheless, inflation-adjusted dollars is not the correct methodology to asses the impact on the debt. You don’t compare to the dollar baseline. You compare to what revenue would have been without the tax cut, which is why % of GDP is used.

Um, that doesn’t make any sense. The entire point of a tax cut is to reduce taxes as a % of GDP; it’s tautological. The theory being tested is precisely that the tax cuts will stimulate the economy such that a lower percentage of a higher GDP is a greater absolute number.

[Josh R]

There is scant evidence that GDP will go up at all in the long term, let alone enough to make up for the loss in revenue/GDP. GDP growth rates were pretty much the same under Reagan (tax cut) versus Clinton (tax increase), as well as Bush43 (tax cut) versus Obama (tax increase).

To be sure, there can be a short-term demand-side impact that is used to stimulate the economy during a downturn. But, that’s not enough to overcome the loss in revenue. And in the long run, the theory is the increase in demand is counterbalanced by the negative effects of increased debt, resulting no long-term greater GDP. The supply-siders have long argued the economy would grow enough to overcome the counterbalance. But, they relied on 4%+ GDP growth which never happens without a war or inflation.

[Commenter_XY]

Josh R…Did you forget there was a large recession in 1982, which would explain lower Fed receipts?

[Josh R]

What explains 1983 and 1984 when the economy was booming? Also, the Reagan tax cuts were phased in over three years.

[Riva]

You’re playing silly games with the data.

Tax revenues always increase after tax cuts. They rose after the Trump cuts. They rose after the Bush tax cuts. They rose after the Reagan cuts. They rose after the 1964 cuts.

As noted above, the revenue increases are undeniable. Period. Paragraph. End of story.

[Malika the Maiz]

Bot pounds table in face of contrary data!

Inflation-adjusted dollars (to 2017):

1981: 1546 billion
1982: 1479
1983: 1369
1984: 1448

[Riva]

Not really interested, since you’re an idiot for all the reasons stated above. Now go F off. You do understand what that means, don’t you? Can’t be the first time you’ve been told to go f yourself. Won’t be the last I’m sure.

[Dr. Ed 2]

“Federal tax receipts as a percent of GDP is remarkably stable despite the major changes in tax policy over the last 30 years.”

In plain English, that means that lowering the tax rates did NOT lower tax receipts. Could GDP include illicit DP and it being replaced with LP with lower rates?

[Brett Bellmore]

At the very least, tax cuts reduce revenue in the long term by a lot less than any static analysis would suggest.

[Sarcastr0]

Brett would like to second guess the experts again…maybe. It’s hard to tell.

His priors are smarter.

[Brett Bellmore]

That’s not second guessing the experts, it’s listening to the experts. Static scoring is well known to be unrealistic.

[Sarcastr0]

So this theory everyone agrees is wrong is wrong.

Ok then.

[dwb68]

This is true; at the same time, tax hikes raise revenue by a lot less for the same reason.

[Josh R]

Citation?

[bernard11]

tax cuts reduce revenue in the long term by a lot less than any static analysis would suggest.

Well, OK. We know that.

So-called “dynamic scoring” can also be quite inaccurate, especially in the hands of ideologues who derive assumptions from desired conclusions. It was much misapplied in the 1980’s to justify Reagan’s policies.

Do you imagine you have a better understanding of these issues than those who spend their careers studying them?

[Michael P]

Rep. Buddy Carter is out there fighting the good fight.

https://www.congress.gov/bill/119th-congress/house-bill/1161

This bill authorizes the President to enter into negotiations with the government of Denmark to purchase or otherwise acquire Greenland. The bill also renames Greenland as Red, White, and Blueland.

[Martinned]

Clear evidence that the US House of Representatives has too many members…

[Krayt]

Why? It isn’t violent ground acquisition. There may be policy objections, but I would expect real reasons to be ag’in, beyond reflexive But Trump.

[ducksalad]

OK, the real policy objections, from least to most important:

1. We already bought islands from Denmark on the supposed basis of defense and economic needs. Turned out to not have a lot of economic or defense impact.
2. Names shouldn’t have commas in them. It causes all kinds of problems.
3. No part of the Constitution authorizes Congress to name stuff that isn’t federal property.
4. The particular people who would actually do the negotiations are lying incompetents and/or people who have sold their souls, so we would not get a good deal.
5. Representative Buddy Carter, and the people who voted for him, should be denied wins just on the basis that frustrating them is a positive social good.
–

[Dr. Ed 2]

The good rep clearly misunderstands the in-your-face aspect of the name “Greenland” — which apparently was once warm enough to also be called Vinland because of the copious amounts of grapes which produced wine.

We should have seized it after WWII as a trophy, we need it for the same strategic reason that Putin needs a warm(er) water port.

[Martinned]

…because the US doesn’t have any warm water ports?

[ThePublius]

What are you talking about?

[Michael P]

If Greenland is mostly north of the Arctic Circle, that must mean that the United States has no warm water ports, duh! It’s just like the only way for a government to stop spending more than it takes in is to collect more taxes. This is all perfectly obvious to Martinned.

[Malika the Maiz]

Look up Pubes and Mikie!

[Martinned]

I was wondering WTF Ed was talking about here:

we need it for the same strategic reason that Putin needs a warm(er) water port.

[Krayt]

Maybe we need cold water ports, like on the Arctic Circle. In the Atlantic. Because Canada and Greenland (already) aren’t letting us fondle them.

[Dr. Ed 2]

In English: RUSSIA wants a port that doesn’t freeze solid in winter. This is part of Putin’s interest in Crimea and the Ukraine — a port that doesn’t freeze solid in winter.

This is both an economic need and — as I stated — a strategic need.
Do you understand why the Nazi sub bases were in France and not Germany proper? Do you have a scintilla of knowledge of basic geography?

The USN has lots of ice-free ports — in fact, I can’t think of a CONUS port that the USN uses that isn’t ice-free, and the biggest (Norfolk) is definitely warm water.

The strategic need of Greenland is location — which has nothing to do with the fact that it probably lacks an ice-free port.

People can’t be stupid enough to not understand my analogy, can they??

[Zarniwoop]

… a port that doesn’t freeze solid in winter.

This is both an economic need and — as I stated — a strategic need. Do you understand why the Nazi sub bases were in France and not Germany proper?

1) Direct access to the Atlantic, duh. That didn’t go through the North Sea or the Straight of Dover. Which the British effectively blockaded during WWI, keeping the German High Seas Fleet based in warm water ports such as Wilhelmshaven from being effective (see, e.g., Battle of Jutland).

2) Submarine range. Much closer to the trans-Atlantic supply lines from US to UK than the U-boat bases in the warm water German ports.

3) The Heligoland Bight is pretty shallow, which makes submarines easier targets for airplanes when returning to the warm water ports in Germany.

Grampa Ed, military sooooper genius!

[Martinned]

Ah, so the reference to Putin made no sense whatsoever?

[Dr. Ed 2]

Did you miss the “Putin needs”????

[John F. Carr]

Mostly harmless. At least it is not an authorization for the use of military force to acquire Greenland.

[Malika the Maiz]

Mostly ridiculous, like most of the Mad King’s priorities.

[Bob from Ohio]

“The bill also renames Greenland as Red, White, and Blueland.”

LOL Best bill this term!

[No its not passing, its nor even getting out of committee]

[Malika the Maiz]

Bob likes trolling more than a fisherman.

[Bob from Ohio]

Its a funny sentence. Get a sense of humor

[Malika the Maiz]

You praised the bill, not the sentence.

[grb]

Bob from Ohio : “LOL Best bill this term!”

Thus today’s Right. It started decades ago with the popularity of right-wing talk radio. They got an hour or two of entertainment each day before having to return to real issues & solutions – and soon found themselves addicted to the feeling. Then Fox News arrived and they could consume entertainment news 24/7. It was only a matter of time before they got the reality-TV-show politicians they needed to round-out this consumer product.

These days, if you’re a Republican and not providing cartoon theatrics or pro-wrestling-grade thrills to the loyal viewers, you’re just a worthless RINO. It’s all freak-show carnival all the time. Trump is more symptom than cause. Today’s Right is a hollow nihilistic shell, but if they get their yuks and prefab Rage™, that’s the only thing important to them.

[Dr. Ed 2]

Student suspended for barking at 7th grader who thought she was a cat and hissed at him.

https://www.themainewire.com/2025/05/maine-school-suspends-student-for-barking-at-furry-who-allegedly-used-gay-slur/

This all apparently really happened…

[John F. Carr]

I know the article denies being satire. It has to be satire.

[John F. Carr]

After further thought, I suspect somebody fell for a hoax. Tall tales about Maine furries have been circulating.

[Martinned]

Sure…

[Sarcastr0]

Single sourced stories telling the right what they want to hear are gospel on the right.

[Dr. Ed 2]

Surely Gaslighto has heard of FERPA — how would you source it more than child & parent?

[TwelveInchPianist]

The story has an image of an incident report, and the offense listed is, “He barked at a peer in the classroom yesterday afternoon…”

[David Nieporent]

Remember how Dr. Ed thought FERPA banned windows in classrooms?

[TwelveInchPianist]

“Single sourced stories telling the right what they want to hear are gospel on the right.”

As are single sourced stories telling the left what they want to hear. We had a whole movement about it, remember?

[Frank Drackman]

Give her some Catnip and he’ll be all up in that (redacted)

[Michael P]

The Washington Poo posted Hamas propaganda that blamed Israel for the murder of civilians (for waiting to collect food aid) and only walked it back after Israel provided video showing that the civilians were shot by Hamas gunmen.

https://x.com/washingtonpost/status/1929961283593367559

[Sarcastr0]

Your source for the Washington Post getting it wrong is…the Washington Post.

To less of a tool, that would tell you something about journalistic standards.
But for you, admitting fault is just more fodder for confirmation bias, and it’s time to deploy the childish nickname.

Maybe there is something to this; plenty of bias on all sides of this issue.
But you, who prefer anecdotes to actual established patterns, aren’t going to be the one to suss it out.

[Malika the Maiz]

“Your source for the Washington Post getting it wrong is…the Washington Post.”

You can’t make this stuff up.

[ThePublius]

“Your source for the Washington Post getting it wrong is…the Washington Post.”

Yes, that’s what ‘walking it back means.’

“…and only walked it back after Israel provided video showing that the civilians were shot by Hamas gunmen.”

They perpetrated and promulgated a dangerous lie and got caught.

[Malika the Maiz]

This is a tiring thing about the internet. Getting something wrong is not always lying. And the quick correction here suggests the former more than the latter.

The rush to be first is a much larger problem in the “MSM” as bias.

[Brett Bellmore]

It’s true that getting something wrong isn’t always lying, but you expect newspapers, especially major ones, to do a bit of due diligence before leveling serious accusations. And taking Hamas controlled “Gaza health authorities” word for anything is NOT due diligence.

In this case the WaPo admitted they screwed up, and it takes a pretty major screw up before that happens. So don’t defend what they thought THEY couldn’t defend.

[Malika the Maiz]

It’s not defending something to say it was wrong and that wrong doesn’t necessarily mean lying.

[Brett Bellmore]

Taking Hamas controlled sources at their word is pretty much equivalent to lying, they’ve been caught lying so often.

[Malika the Maiz]

It looks like there’s wrong to around. They did not just take the health ministry’s word. From the article:

“The Washington Post interviewed three eyewitnesses to the shootings, as well three doctors who attended to the casualties and family members of the wounded. One witness, 43-year-old Mohammed al-Gharib, a local journalist, said he was a little over 100 yards from the gunfire when it erupted early Sunday. He said that it came from Israeli forces in the area and that he witnessed a quadcopter flying overhead before he escaped….”

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2025/06/01/israel-gaza-aid-rafah-shooting/

So, were those who said they only relied on the health ministry wrong or lying?

[ThePublius]

It’s a kind of lie. The story was too good to check out, it fit the MSM narrative too well, so the Post and most other outlets went with it, based solely on reports form Hamas and related outlets like the Gaza Health Ministry – all well known for lying.

You’ve hear the saying “if it bleeds, it leads.” Now it’s “if it’s anti-Israeli, it leads.”

By the way, in case you haven’t looked into it, it appears Hamas was shooting Palestinians for taking advantage of aid distributed by GHF.

[Malika the Maiz]

I’m no fan of Hamas. It sounds as much if not more like rushed bad reporting (not taking the time to check more sources) than a lie.

[ThePublius]

Here’s the WaPo correction, in full:

“Correction: We’ve deleted the post below because it and early versions of the article didn’t meet Post fairness standards.

The background: Early versions of the article on Sunday stated that Israeli troops had killed more than 30 people near a U.S. aid site in Gaza, with the headline attributing the action to “health officials.”

The article failed to make clear if attributing the deaths to Israel was the position of the Gaza health ministry or a fact verified by The Post. The article and headline were updated on Sunday evening making it clear that there was no consensus about who was responsible for the shootings and that there was a dispute over that question.

While statements from Israel that it was unaware of injuries and that an initial inquiry indicated its soldiers didn’t fire at civilians near the site were included in all versions, The Post didn’t give proper weight to Israel’s denial and gave improper certitude about what was known about any Israeli role in the shootings. The early versions fell short of Post standards of fairness and should not have been published in that form.”

Note that this is a correction posted to X, but I can’t find it in WaPo online, and they are even today publishing stories supporting the original narrative. Shameful.

[tylertusta]

but I can’t find it in WaPo online

You can find an Editor’s Note at the bottom of the now-corrected article.

https://archive.ph/FIruK

and they are even today publishing stories supporting the original narrative

“Israel says it fired ‘warning shots’ near aid site; health officials say 27 dead”

Yep.

When you open the article it says that the action by Israel was unrelated to and at a different location from the massacres happening at the aid sites, yet WaPo clearly equated the two in the title of their article.

https://archive.is/0mQVN

[ThePublius]

There are a couple of articles today repeating the flawed narrative, with no such editor’s note. Here’s one:
https://wapo.st/4dMNApy

[Malika the Maiz]

“Post and most other outlets went with it, based solely on reports form Hamas and related outlets like the Gaza Health Ministry”

Now that that seems inaccurate, were you wrong or lying?

“While three witnesses said the gunfire came from Israeli military positions, the Israel Defense Forces denied the allegations, saying in a statement that an initial inquiry indicated that its soldiers did not fire at civilians while they were near or within the distribution site.”
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2025/06/01/israel-gaza-aid-rafah-shooting/

[ThePublius]

I subscribe to WaPo. I read the articles published today, and they persist in this narrative that Israel shot dozens of Palestinians seeking aid, based on the Gaza Ministry of Health and other known unreliable sources.

[Malika the Maiz]

When you said said the Post relied solely on the health ministry were you wrong or lying? Because they did not. According to your logic you engaged in a kind of lie.

[Bored Lawyer]

No, that’s not the problem. The “wrong” in this case is almost always a wrong that shows Israel in a very poor light. When was the last time that WAPO got it wrong in a way that shows Israel positively.

The problem here is accepting Hamas propaganda at face value without checking out its veracity. And by now, Hamas has repeatedly been shown to lie, and lie in a big way, for propaganda purposes.

Suppose a QAnon group announces that it has proof positive that Jews slaughter Christian children to use their blood to bake matzah. Do you suppose WAPO would give such a report the same credulity it gave this one? And splash it across the front page?

[Sarcastr0]

Almost always!

Vibes again.

I don’t know the sources here, but I suspect it wasn’t Hamas.
Not that BL can tell between Hamas and anyone critical of Israel.
And it’s not like the Israeli government is a model of honesty.

[ThePublius]

Well, if you read the articles you would know the sources cited, which prominently feature the Gaza Health Ministry (controlled by Hamas) and the Palestinian government in Gaza (which is Hamas).

Compared to Hamas, Israel is as honest as the day is long.

[Malika the Maiz]

“which prominently feature”

Oh, so now it’s “prominently feature” instead of “solely relied on.” Good retraction. Wrong or lying the first time?

[Bob from Ohio]

“I suspect it wasn’t Hamas”

Vibes!

Hamas government and “local journalist” aka Hamas operative

The WaPo stringer[s] are also Hamas controlled or they would not be allowed to “report” stuff.

[Malika the Maiz]

I don’t know about the WaPo but CNN has done that.

https://www.yahoo.com/news/cnn-quietly-cut-disputed-israeli-005939159.html

[Krayt]

It may not be lying, but it was definitely credophile behavior, confirmation bias, whatever term you like.

I hasten to add, this is no stranger to Trump supporters.

[Michael P]

Wrong. The Washington Post is my source for … the Washington Post walking it back. I found out about the shooting, that lamestream media were wrongly blaming Israel for it, and that Israel provided video evidence to the contrary, from other sources. I didn’t link to those because dishonest, denialist shits refuse to accept any source outside your echo chamber.

[tylertusta]

Journalistic standards should have prevented them from writing such an incendiary article in the first place when getting it right only required the very basic level of investigation on the part of the authors, especially since their sourcing comes from the ever-reliable “local health ministry” run by Hamas and other Gazan locals who definitely have never lied about an Israeli atrocity before.

This is the reporting equivalent of “Shoot first, ask questions later.”

They deserve to be scolded for getting it wrong. They do not deserve praise for retracting it; their only reward is not getting scolded for doubling down.

[Sarcastr0]

What are your less incendiary sources again?

[tylertusta]

I said: “writing such an incendiary article”

You replied: “What are your less incendiary sources again?”

Straw man.

[Commenter_XY]

Does Wa-Poo have any journalistic standards? It is hard to tell. Maybe you can tell us what they are.

[Mr. Bumble]

…and the clock is counting down to the end of the second (and illegal) extension of the deadline for Tik Tok to find a buyer or be shut down.

[Armchair]

For our good friend Martinned…Dutch election news.

The BBC reports,

The Dutch government has collapsed after Geert Wilders withdrew his far-right party from the governing coalition following a row over migration.

In the European context, “far-right” merely means that the political party opposes mass immigration. The collapse of the Dutch coalition government is yet another in an endless stream of examples of the phenomenon that voters prefer conservative government but can’t ever seem to get it.

So, the Netherlands is headed for their third general election in the past four years.

–A little history—
For decades, the population of the Netherlands had been 95 percent Dutch and 5 percent “other,” nearly all of which were legacies of the former Dutch colonial empire.

By 2000, the share of the Dutch in the nation’s population had slipped to 91 percent, with the nation now 3 percent Muslim (the plurality of the nation, at the time, being nonreligious).

Enter a man named Pim Fortuyn. Up to this point (age 53), he had been an academic and media figure but got into politics on the single issue of opposing mass immigration. Fortuyn was openly gay and preferred the Netherlands just the way it was. He could see the future and didn’t like it.

Fortuyn entered politics in late 2001. He ran as the head of a new party in the Rotterdam municipal election of March 2002, He was elected to the city council as head of the leading party, which represented a massive shift to the right. He managed to form a conservative-majority government in the Netherlands’ second-largest city.

Fortuyn formed his own party (unimaginatively named Pim Fortuyn List) to run in the general election for national parliament to be held May 15, 2002. Although brand new, public opinion polls immediately indicated that it was one of the most popular in the Netherlands.

On May 6, 2002, Fortuyn was murdered in a parking lot outside of a radio station where he had just sat for an interview. Fortuyn was shot five times in the back at point-blank range.

His murderer was a 32-year-old left-wing environmentalist who wished to prevent Fortuyn from becoming Prime Minister. This being the Netherlands, the killer spent only 12 years in prison. The national election was held nine days later. Fortuyn’s party, without a leader, finished second overall and subsequently joined a short-lived, right-leaning majority government.

—-Wow. Just 12 years in Prison for cold blooded murder—

[Armchair]

Oh, you all need the link.

https://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2025/06/dutch-elections.php

[Martinned]

Yes, I noticed.

And, for the record, the man who killed Fortuyn was exactly convicted of manslaughter, not premeditated murder. You might think that he was mis-charged, but that’s an issue you should take up with the prosecutor’s office. The man who killed Theo van Gogh was charged with premeditated murder with terorrist intent, which is why he will die in prison. Different cases, different charges. (None of which has anything to do with politics today, of course.)

[Armchair]

“The details of the murder emerged later; the accounts of the investigators and Van der Graaf were consistent. He had planned the attack using information obtained from the Internet; printouts of a map of the scene of the crime and schedules of Fortuyn’s appearances were found in his car. In two boxes of cartridges found at his home, seven cartridges were missing, the exact number loaded in his gun. The attack has been described as the work of a single person, an amateur shooter who used a relatively simple plan and did not prepare a good escape route.

Van der Graaf purchased his weapon and ammunition illegally; a semi-automatic Star Firestar M43 pistol in a café in Ede and 9mm cartridges in The Hague.”

But just “manslaughter” and 12 years in Prison.

Maybe the US penal system is better.

[Martinned]

Unlikely.

But to assist in your understanding, I went back to the original judgments.

– District Court: https://uitspraken.rechtspraak.nl/details?id=ECLI:NL:RBAMS:2003:AF7291
– Court of Appeal: https://uitspraken.rechtspraak.nl/details?id=ECLI:NL:GHAMS:2003:AI0123

(No English translation available, I think.)

I have to correct my earlier statement. He was convicted of premeditated murder. But he confessed (there are no pleas in the Netherlands, but basically he pled guilty), had no priors, and the psychiatric report suggested some mitigating circumstances and concluded that he was unlikely to reoffend.

Apart from murder he was also convicted of possession of a fire arm and of threatening violence against Fortuyn’s chauffeur. He got a sentence of 18 years, and was released on parole after 12.

[Bob from Ohio]

“had no priors, and the psychiatric report suggested some mitigating circumstances and concluded that he was unlikely to reoffend”

Your country sucks

[ObviouslyNotSpam]

Did he reoffend?

[Martinned]

He’s been free for about a decade, and if he’d done something during that period I assume the country would have exploded.

For the record, the appeals judgment arrived at the same sentence but criticised the district court for the reliance on risk of reoffending, so ultimately it placed less weight on that factor.

[Dr. Ed 2]

I find it disturbing that the murder of a high ranking national political figure — even from a different party than the one currently in office — is taken less seriously than the murder of an artist.

The 1972 shooting of then-candidate George Wallace is a similar but lesser crime because Wallace survived, and the perp was sentenced to 63 years and wound up serving 35.

[Martinned]

The murderer of Theo van Gogh pinned a note to his chest threatening parliament, so that was explicitly a terrorist offence against the sitting parliament and government. When Fortuyn was murdered he was a private citizen, and the killer did not try to force the government to do anything.

[Kazinski]

The fact the prosecutor only charged him with manslaughter just underscores how soft the Netherlands is on crime.

Not that we don’t have the same problem here in blue jurisdictions.

[ObviouslyNotSpam]

Indeed! Unfortunately, the Netherlands’ infamously criminal softness somehow isn’t reflected in its crime statistics, which suggest it has almost half as much of the stuff as the US of A.

[Martinned]

In the European context, “far-right” merely means that the political party opposes mass immigration.

No, it means the party opposes any sort of immigration to the point of being willing to trash the constitution to keep the brown people out.

When the last government was formed they had to resort to a special “pinky promise” document setting out that they would definitely obey the constitution, which no previous government had ever found necessary to affirm. And still Geert Wilders tried to declare an immigration emergency so he could do a run around, bypassing normal democratic procedure. Sound familiar?

[Armchair]

No, it means the party opposes any sort of immigration to the point of being willing to trash the constitution to keep the brown people out

“By this time, the demographics of the Netherlands had shifted exactly as Fortuyn had predicted. The Dutch share of the population had fallen from 91 percent to 72 percent, and the Muslim share had doubled from 3 percent to 6 percent.”

Pretty dramatic shift that. Dropping from 91% Dutch to 72% Dutch in the span of less than 25 years. Another 25 years like that, and the Dutch may be close to being a minority in their own country.

[Martinned]

Careful, your racism is showing.

[Brett Bellmore]

I’m sorry, I didn’t realize “Dutch” and “Muslim” were races.

What he’s demonstrating is that migration into the Netherlands is at such a high pace that it will shortly render the Dutch a minority in their own country. And the Netherlands will very soon have a high enough percentage of Muslims that de facto Sharia law will start to kick in, as it has in England.

The Dutch apparently don’t like that, but their governing class mostly approve of it, so the Dutch aren’t to be allowed any choice in the matter.

This seems to be a widespread thing in the West: Governing classes that don’t like their own people, and set out to replace them by immigration. With the people themselves not being allowed to stop it.

Well, the Dutch have been pretty clever, creating new land by technology. Maybe they can build floating islands for themselves to live on, once their government has given their country to other people.

[tylertusta]

Stating that the people
Had forfeited the confidence of the government
And could win it back only
By redoubled efforts. Would it not be easier
In that case for the government
To dissolve the people
And elect another?

[bernard11]

Who are these “Dutch” you are so keen on protecting from presumably “non-Dutch” inhabitants?

What are the distinguishing features?

[Poxigah146]

Being white and Christian, for starters.

[ObviouslyNotSpam]

The article notes that blasphemy was only removed from the UK’s criminal laws in 2008, which makes its (effective) return in 2025 somewhat less shocking.

[Martinned]

In the UK 26 bisshops sit in the legislature, so if you’re measuring it by the US version of separation of church and state, never mind a serious version of the separation of church and state, I think you’ll find the UK wanting.

[ObviouslyNotSpam]

Having lived there for some time, I would never do such a thing.

There are clearly consequences from a country not having a proper constitution or an enforceable Bill of Rights, and the UK is an excellent example. I still recall when Labour decided to gut the venerable concept of double jeopardy (so much so that the US Founders had adopted it in full) using an ordinary act of Parliament.

Poof!

Other examples, of course, abound, but my comment to Brett was really just an observation that his alarmist interpretation of the UK’s current incarnation of the law against blasphemy was not all that surprising, given the country’s long history of…blasphemy legislation. The main difference now appears to be the persons against whom it is being directed.

[David Nieporent]

I’m sorry, I didn’t realize “Dutch” and “Muslim” were races.

What do you think the author meant by “The Dutch share of the population had fallen from 91 percent to 72 percent,” or “the Dutch may be close to being a minority in their own country”?

Neither of those are intelligible claims without viewing those as races. Just because Americans use a different taxonomy such that “white” rather than “Dutch” is a category and such that (for most of us) American and Muslim are not mutually exclusive doesn’t mean that the Dutch think the same way.

[Brett Bellmore]

“Ethnicities” don’t exist anymore?

Not every damn group is a “race”!

[Kazinski]

There is nothing wrong with being concerned about the indigenous population of the Netherlands.

[shawn_dude]

When brown people migrate to the Netherlands and have babies, those brown babies are “Dutch,” are they not?

Your Philosopher’s Axe argument is racist.

[Poxigah146]

Only if you think that race and ethnicity is not a component of nationality.

[Kazinski]

But they are not indigenous to Northern Europe.

You certainly aren’t going to claim that people of European descent living in New York are every bit as indigenous to NY as Mohawks, even though Dutch settlers have been in NY for almost 400 years, are you?

Or for that matter Boers have been in South Africa 400 years, are they indigenous?

The only indigenous in Australia are descendents of Aboriginies and Torres Strait Islanders.

And don’t try to tell Moari’s that non Maoris of any race have been there long enough to be indigenous.

Moroccans and Indonesian colonizers, even if they are born in the Netherlands, should be performing land acknowledgement ceremonies to honor the original Germanic and Celtic inhabitants.

[shawn_dude]

You haven’t supported your implied claim that indigenous peoples are more “Dutch” or “American” than non-indigenous or that they deserve special preservation by restricting immigration.

The problem with colonizers isn’t that they’re non-indigenous but that they’re racist assholes who cannot be trusted to honor their treaties. (See, by example, the history of British colonization of New Zealand–since you brought up the Maori.)

Your use of “indigenous” isn’t giving you the hook you need to avoid the appearance of racism and xenophobia while trying to keep non-white people out of majority-white countries.

[David Nieporent]

And by the way, this is what I meant when I talked about assimilation: if a society takes the position that one can never actually be ‘Dutch’ (or whatever) unless one is of ‘Dutch ancestry’ (to the extent that this isn’t tautological), then assimilation won’t be possible.

[Malika the Maiz]

A person can be Dutch and Muslim, right? I mean, the “of the population” kinda implies that? So it could be a kind of bigotry tocompare the Dutch and Muslim part of the Dutch population.

[Brett Bellmore]

Not racism, anyway.

In the early 70’s, just like in the US, Muslims were under 1% of the Dutch population. Almost all Muslims in the Netherlands and the US are a result of immigration.

I’ll grant that Muslims born in the Netherlands are “Dutch”, but the situation absolutely is a product of immigration.

[Malika the Maiz]

When you said they Muslims that are citizens of the Netherlands are Dutch, I would have thought.

[Malika the Maiz]

There, not they.

[Kazinski]

Dutch is an ethnicity, as well as a nationality, and one can be of Dutch nationality but not dutch ethnicity, and vice versa.

[Malika the Maiz]

How is five times in the back manslaughter? That’s a hell of a fit of passion.

[Martinned]

Under Dutch law murder = premeditated murder. Everything else is manslaughter or culpable death. But, as noted above, I misremembered. He was convicted of premeditated murder.

Under current law (art. 289 Penal Code) the maximum sentence for a single murder is life or 30 years. But before 9 January 2006 the maximum sentence was life or 20 years. And this murder was committed in 2002. So he didn’t get life, but apart from that he almost got the maximum. (The other crimes that he was convicted of weighed in on that, of course.)

[Mr. Bumble]

“So he didn’t get life, but apart from that he almost got the maximum.”
He served 12 years, but what was the sentence? 12 years hardly seems close to 20 years.

[Martinned]

At the relevant time the rule was that prisoners were released on parole automatically after 2/3 of their sentece was up. (Unless they misbehaved in prison, etc.) The UK has a similar rule, but at 50%. This is generally a good system, because it allows for prisoners to have skin in the game while they’re in prison, and it allows for their liberty to be restricted while they’re on parole, during a period of re-entry into society.

[Brett Bellmore]

It’s manslaughter when it takes out the political opposition, I expect.

[Drewski]

“Wow. Just 12 years in Prison for cold blooded murder”

Do you think the Netherlands’ murder rate is higher or lower than that of countries with more severe penalties?

[Martinned]

In 2023 there were 125 cases of murder or manslaughter in the Netherlands, down by about half since the start of the century. In recent years the number of people charged with murder or manslaughter has been steady at around 100, which suggests a pretty good solve rate or a lot of murders committed by groups.

https://www.cbs.nl/nl-nl/nieuws/2024/35/125-mensen-vermoord-in-2023

[Michael P]

The omissions, denials and things that didn’t happen in this story about a Saturday afternoon fight at the National Zoo (such as no arrests) say much more than what is affirmatively described.

https://www.wusa9.com/article/news/community/fight-at-national-zoo-dc-prompts-shelter-in-place/65-00fda67b-efc7-4eb0-9a1c-75472df50093

[Frank Drackman]

DC Zoo, where it’s hard to tell the monkeys from the patrons (the monkeys are the ones NOT throwing their shit at each other)

[Malika the Maiz]

The writer of the Frank Fakeman persona seems to forget that one minute the character is being racist and the next crying over the “black baby holocaust” of abortion. Haven’t seen such confused writing since the last season of Lost!

[bye]

The testimony given to Congress contradicts you

THE EFFECTS OF ABORTION
ON THE BLACK COMMUNITY

Black women are 5 times
more likely to have an abortion than white
women. A recent study released by
Protecting Black Life, an outreach of Life
Issues Institute concluded that, “79% of
Planned Parenthood’s surgical abortion
facilities are strategically located within
walking distance of African and/or
Hispanic communities

AND

“Since the number of current living blacks
(in the U.S.) is 31 million, the missing 10 million represents
an enormous loss for, without abortion, America’s black
community would now number 41 million persons. It would
be 35 percent larger than it is currently. Abortion has swept
through the black community cutting down every fourth
member.”

That is genocide to all but you

[not guilty]

Genocide does not mean what you seem to think it means, bye.

[ThePublius]

What about the IDF offensive in Gaza; is that genocide? Or the murder of white farmers (Boers) in South Africa; is that genocide?

[Malika the Maiz]

None of these is imho.

[LexAquilia]

The correct term is “democide”.

[Malika the Maiz]

It doesn’t contradict me because my point was about the Frank Fakeman character’s contradictions, ya goof.

[Frank Drackman]

It’s more like 60-70 million, you have the 20-30 million aborted in the first place (really difficult math, 1/2 a million per year over 50+ odd years) and then the kids the aborted females would have born, oldest aborted baby since “Roe” would be 52, so most would still be alive, of course given the black fertility rate you’d have several generations to consider (In med Screw-el delivered the baby of a 20 something Grandmother)

[Malika the Maiz]

Someone make up a hanky for the made up Frank Fakeman.

[David Nieporent]

“Since the number of current living blacks
(in the U.S.) is 31 million, the missing 10 million represents
an enormous loss for, without abortion, America’s black
community would now number 41 million persons. It would
be 35 percent larger than it is currently. Abortion has swept
through the black community cutting down every fourth
member.”

That is genocide to all but you

That is not genocide to any speaker of the English language. It’s also not logic to any speaker of the English language; it bizarrely assumes that anyone who had a kid rather than an abortion would then go on to have as many more kids as she did after she did have an abortion.

[Frank Drackman]

Not confused, I’m not just into killing babies of any race

[Malika the Maiz]

Your character has other made up interests in addition to killing babies of any race?

[Frank Drackman]

Just because I have Character doesn’t make me a Character, I’m more real than Senator Poke-a-Hontas’s Injun Cheekbones.

[Malika the Maiz]

Made up is made up.

[ThePublius]

More progress:

“In a bold and long-overdue move, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has ordered the U.S. Navy to strip Harvey Milk’s name from a naval vessel—bringing an end to the shameful glorification of a man whose disturbing behavior was whitewashed in the name of political correctness. ”

“Let that sink in: The Obama administration knowingly celebrated a man with a well-documented history of grooming and exploiting vulnerable teenage boys. Obama’s celebration of this pedophile continued with the Medal of Freedom and a commemorative postage stamp, and finally, in a move that defies all decency, the U.S. Navy christened a ship in his name.

Thank you, Pete Hegseth, for doing the right thing.”

https://pjmedia.com/matt-margolis/2025/06/03/happy-pride-month-hegseth-strips-harvey-milks-name-from-navy-ship-n4940421

[tylertusta]

The decision to do this during “Pride Month” was deliberate, too.

[ThePublius]

Oh, and how do you know this?

[tylertusta]

Besides the fact that renaming the ship is a deliberate act, SecDef Hegseth is a culture warrior and he loves fighting it. He renamed two military bases that were renamed during the Biden years.

[Brett Bellmore]

Maybe, but if it was, so what? They were supposed to keep the ship named after a pedophile for an extra month, just because we’re currently celebrating one of the cardinal sins?

[Swede425]

Renaming a Navy ship that was named after a known pedo really has them in a tizzy this morning.
And the unmitigated gall to do it during Pedo Appreciation Month really takes the (you have to bake my) cake!

[Malika the Maiz]

It’s Catholic priest month?

[TwelveInchPianist]

Isn’t that what the + is?

[Malika the Maiz]

That’s twice you’ve made me laugh today (the class action joke being the first). Nice.

[tylertusta]

You misunderstand me. I don’t disapprove of renaming the ships- I actually approve of it. The sooner we get away from naming ships after people the better: States, cities, towns, rivers, lakes, famous battles in American history, and the like.

Naming ships after people- especially living people as we’ve started doing- is vainglorious, political back-scratching that turns the Navy into just another front in the culture war. Neutrality is how the military should approach things.

I just think that it’s funny that Hegseth is tweaking the whiskers of the left by doing this in June.

[Malika the Maiz]

Trolling by one of the highest officials in the land, what fun!

[tylertusta]

Left-wingers have no sense of humor, which makes it even funnier.

[JoeFromtheBronx]

Or it isn’t really funny. YMMV.

[Malika the Maiz]

Trolling is often sad but can be ok and senses of humor are fine, but trolling by the Secretary of Defense is puerile over professionalism.

[shawn_dude]

Government signals it’s open season on homosexuals again. What fun!

Gosh! those gays have no sense of humor! amirite?!

[bye]

all rights are human rights, there are no Trans, Gay, or Pervert rights.
So, no persecuation is justified, no favoritism either. If you are old enough you have seen the increase in pseudo-rights just fuel hatrd, violence, and discord.

[shawn_dude]

This calls for The Onion.

https://theonion.com/why-do-all-these-homosexuals-keep-sucking-my-cock-1819584210/

[Dr. Ed 2]

Would that be like how Massachusetts’ decision to force the Wynn Casino to be renamed the Encore Casino because of Wynn’s alleged mistreatment of women was done on heterosexual pride month?

Who exactly deeded months to identity groups?

[tylertusta]

Who exactly deeded months to identity groups?

Cultural marxists have seized the calendar for the good of the racial proletariat.

[Malika the Maiz]

Those cultural Marxists!

“In tribute to all Irish Americans, the US Congress, by Public Law 101-418, designated March 1991 as “Irish-American Heritage Month”[1] Congress again proclaimed March as Irish-American Heritage Month for 1995 and 1996.[2]
Within the authority of the executive branch, the President of the United States has also issued a proclamation each year since 1991.[3][4]”
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irish-American_Heritage_Month

[David Nieporent]

Using “cultural marxist” is one of two things: knowingly adopting a nonsensical historical Nazi slogan, or unknowingly adopting a nonsensical historical Nazi slogan.

[tylertusta]

…or I’m accurate describing the evolution of communists in the post Cold War world and it ruffles your feathers.

[Noscitur a sociis]

What

[Sarcastr0]

Incredible defense need here. Culture war bullshit and you love it.

Other names under review according to CBS:
USNS Thurgood Marshall, USNS Ruth Bader Ginsburg, USNS Harriet Tubman, USNS Dolores Huerta, USNS Lucy Stone, USNS Cesar Chavez and USNS Medgar Evers.

Only straight white conservative men count.

Hard not to see this as more bigotry than equality.

[ThePublius]

I have nothing against non-white, non-male, non-straight people. I do have something against a celebrated pedophile (Milk).

[Frank Drackman]

Fitting that the ship named after him is an “Oiler” (wouldn’t a “Cruiser” have been more fitting?)

[shawn_dude]

What evidence do you have, other than the age old slur that gay men are “pedophiles” to back up your assertion?

[tylertusta]

I can’t speak for Hegseth, but I suspect he has a problem with ‘civil rights leaders’ getting their names on naval ships when there are much better, more worthy names with actual historical and naval significance.

Only straight white conservative men count.

USS Doris Miller, a Ford-class carrier, would disagree with you.

Then there’s the USS Jimmy Carter, a Seawolf-class nuclear submarine extensively modified for special operations. Jimmy Carter, as you are aware, was famously a raging, hard-right conservative.

How about the USS Teddy Roosevelt, a Nimitz-class carrier? Or the USS Harry S Truman?

Not enough?

How about arch-conservative FDR, who has the Arleigh Burke-class USS Roosevelt named after him?

I think you get the point.

[ObviouslyNotSpam]

What makes you think none of those examples are…next?

[tylertusta]

Because those names either have strong naval traditions, Presidents who were in the military, or Presidents who were big naval proponents.

And in the case of Doris Miller, received a Medal of honor at Pearl Harbor.

(Except Slick Willie, that is)

[Swede425]

LOL!
“Culture war bullshit and you love it”.
Don’t start none, won’t be none.
As I’m sure you know.

[Bob from Ohio]

“Culture war bullshit ”

Culture war = conservatives notice stuff

The original namings had nothing to do with “culture war bullshit” of course.

[tylertusta]

Didn’t you hear about Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s storied career as a naval officer?

[Malika the Maiz]

Nothing new here.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/USRC_Harriet_Lane

[tylertusta]

I know RBG was old when she passed away. Did she serve on a pre-Civil War ship?

[Malika the Maiz]

If it’s ok to name a ship after a senator’s niece it’s probably ok to name one after a Supreme Court justice, and I doubt it was cultural Marxist wokesters who did the former in 1850.

[tylertusta]

As you’ve no doubt already read and ignored, I am not in favor of any person being named.

https://reason.com/volokh/2025/06/04/wednesday-open-thread-19/?comments=true#comment-11074453

My question is why you’d bring up the Harriet Lane in a comment chain talking about RBG’s fictional naval career.

[Malika the Maiz]

Because if naming a ship after RBG is culture war nonsense because she had no naval career what is naming a ship in 1850 after a Senator’s daughter with no naval career?

[tylertusta]

More nonsense?

I’m not sure what you’re trying to get at here.

[Brett Bellmore]

Harriet Tubman is a perfectly good name for a military ship. She was a real badass. Don’t know why you’d name a military ship after any of those others.

[Dr. Ed 2]

OK, are there ships named after SCOTUS justices other than Marshall and Ginsburg?

Marshall may have been a vet but Ginsburg clearly wasn’t.

[Malika the Maiz]

Now he can get back to naming things after murderous traitors in the defense of slavery!

I wouldn’t name anything after Milk, but Publius’s electives is showing here. Some past sins are more forgivable I guess!

[Bob from Ohio]

“Now he can get back to naming things after murderous traitors in the defense of slavery!”

A lie.

[Malika the Maiz]

The truth.

[not guilty]

Bob, what part of Malika’s observation do you dispute? The murder? The treason? The defense of slavery?

It seems like a common sense observation to me.

[grb]

To be fair, Trump is trying a new strategy. He names things after an unknown person with the same name as murderous traitors in the defense of slavery:

“Fort Liberty is renamed Fort Bragg, effective immediately. This renaming honors the legacy of World War II hero, Pvt. First Class Roland L. Bragg and all Soldiers and families who have called Fort Bragg home.”

It’s something for PFCs everywhere to aspire to (and I was once one). Plus, of course, a nod and wink to those who like murderous traitors in the defense of slavery. And – needless to say – there’s no shortage of them…

https://www.army.mil/article/283111/fort_liberty_is_renamed_fort_bragg_effective_immediately

[ObviouslyNotSpam]

What does Trump have against “liberty”, I wonder…

[Bob from Ohio]

Benning and Bliss were not re-named after Confederates, but US soldiers.

[Malika the Maiz]

Cool story!

https://x.com/SecDef/status/1889119135759585562?lang=en

[Bob from Ohio]

“The new name for the largest installation in the Army honors Army Pfc. Roland L. Bragg, a native of Maine, who enlisted in July 1943 at age 23. During World War II, he served with the 513th Parachute Infantry Regiment, 17th Airborne Division, XVIII Airborne Corps, and completed his Army training at the installation that now bears his name. Following that training, he left for the European theater. ”

“FORT BENNING (AP) — The Army officially restored the name Fort Benning to its storied training post in Georgia, only this time to honor an 18-year-old corporal who fought in World War I rather than a Confederate general.”

I mis-remembered, it was Bragg and Benning, not Bliss.

[Malika the Maiz]

Like I said, cool story, bro. That’s why he wrote Bragg is *back*, lol. Pretty pathetic gaslighting attempt Bob.

[ObviouslyNotSpam]

Kind of like when a mafia boss lies to you, and wants you to know he’s lying to you, but also that you can’t do anything about it, because he’s a mafia boss.

Welcome to New America!

[ThePublius]

“Now he can get back to naming things after murderous traitors in the defense of slavery!”

Oh, really? What are the new ship names???

[Malika the Maiz]

https://x.com/SecDef/status/1889119135759585562?lang=en

(I said things).

[Bob from Ohio]

Not re-named after Braxton Bragg though. but after Roland L. Bragg.

[Malika the Maiz]

“Bragg is back! I just signed a memorandum reversing the naming of Fort Liberty back to Fort Bragg.”

The only back and reversal possible is to it being named after Confederate general Braxton Bragg, which is who it was named for before it was named Fort Liberty. Poor Bob, he tried but I guess didn’t know ol’ ‘Hic Hegseth had already cut him off at the knees with his need to be cute.

[Bob from Ohio]

The memorandum states who it was re-named for, more authoritative than a quick X post.

Show me where Braxton is in the X post?

[Malika the Maiz]

This has been explained to you:

The only back and reversal possible is to it being named after Confederate general Braxton Bragg, which is who it was named for before it was named Fort Liberty.

Do you not know what the words back and reversing mean?

[Mr. Bumble]

USS Pinafore? USS Lollipop?

[TwelveInchPianist]

Sounds like they’ve already chosen the new name.

[not guilty]

U.S. District Court Judge Royce Lamberth has ordered the Trump administration to continue providing gender-affirming care to hundreds of transgender prison inmates, ruling that an abrupt decision to curtail their medical care was not based on any “reasoned” analysis, as the law requires. https://www.politico.com/news/2025/06/03/transgender-inmates-care-ruling-00382603

The order certified the case as a class action. the class consisting of all current and future BOP inmates with a current medical diagnosis of gender dysphoria or who receive such diagnosis in the future. https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.dcd.278186/gov.uscourts.dcd.278186.68.0_5.pdf (The memorandum opinion recites that the BOP represents that, at present, there are 1,028 inmates with gender dysphoria in its custody.)

In granting the preliminary injunction, the District Court held that the plaintiffs are likely to succeed on the merits of their APA claims that the BOP’s enforcement of the Executive Order and the two implementing memoranda violate the APA’s prohibition of arbitrary and capricious agency action. Specifically, the plaintiffs argue that the memoranda are arbitrary and capricious because they provide no reasoned explanation for the denial of gender-affirming care, treat gender dysphoria different than other medical conditions with no justification, and fail to adequately take stock of the sudden reversal in agency policy from before the Executive Order was issued. (Memorandum opinion, p. 17.) https://ecf.dcd.uscourts.gov/cgi-bin/show_public_doc?2025cv0691-67 The Court noted that the plaintiffs also contend that the BOP’s actions should be set aside as contrary to law because they violate the Eighth Amendment to the United States Constitution, but the Court declined to reach the plaintiffs’ constitutional arguments at this time. (Id., at n.4.) At page 27, footnote 8, the Court opined:

It is conceivable that the Court will be required to make a factual determination about the medical necessity of gender-affirming care at some later stage of litigation to address the plaintiffs’ constitutional claims, though even this is not a foregone conclusion. It is certain, however, that the Court need not and will not make any such determination now.

[ThePublius]

Why is it that prisons and the medical industry in general jump to “gender affirming care” in cases of gender dysphoria rather than treatment for the dysphoria, which would largely be psychological treatment?

[Michael P]

If you ask people like Andrew Sullivan, it’s because others want to “trans the gay away”. I think I got the wording right.

[Sarcastr0]

Who else is like that guy?

He’s pretty singular and also not been heard from much in quite some time.

[Michael P]

https://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-29832690

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-11205739/Soon-close-NHS-Tavistock-clinic-accused-transing-gay-away-bitter-legal-dispute.html

There are a lot of examples if you bother to look instead of just falling into your usual denialist mindset.

[Sarcastr0]

So not in the US and not well established as a thing in the UK.

Come on, man.

[Michael P]

No new goalposts, asshole. There are plenty of US examples if you bothered to look for them. https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2022/01/24/time-magazine-promotes-trans-the-gay-away-child/

[Sarcastr0]

That’s a pretty complex story and Breitbart isn’t the place to get that right.

If you are desperately Googling and the best you turn up is Breitbart you may be in trouble,

[Michael P]

You’re trying to move the goalposts yet again, asshole.

[Frank Drackman]

Probably because they have plenty of guys experienced in cutting off guys balls

[Bored Lawyer]

Money. That kind of “care” is very lucrative.

[Sarcastr0]

You saying gender affirming care is a hoax/conspiracy?

[Commenter_XY]

The term gender affirming care is a monstrous lie; the person is doing the opposite, attempting to destroy the physical vestiges of their genetically assigned gender.

Somebody is making money off it. BL’s point stands.

[shawn_dude]

“genetically assigned gender”

Genes don’t “assign” anything; they just are. What gender do XXY chromosomes “assign” to a child? What gender is an intersex child? That these variations on human sexuality exist and are measurable and non-psychological contradicts your opinion that there are only two genders and that they are knowable by looking at one’s “genes” (by which I assume you mean their gonads.) Given that we don’t fully understand how the brain works, it’s plausible that more variations than just these two are at work here. Yet non-psychologists and non-geneticists are insisting that they know genes “assign” a person’s gender and that people who are experiencing a disconnection between their perceived gender and their gonads along with medical experts know less than they do.

[JoeFromtheBronx]

Hopefully, the controlling opinion in United States v. Skrmetti will be limited in scope, leaving open trans protections in the lower federal courts in the appropriate cases.

https://www.scotusblog.com/cases/case-files/united-states-v-skrmetti/

[TwelveInchPianist]

Judges who insist on using politically biased euphemisms like “gender affirming care” instead of more neutral terminology like “cutting their dicks off” should be recused from hearing these types of cases.

I mean, when you get your tonsils taken out, they call it getting your tonsils taken out. When you get a tooth pulled, they call it pulling a tooth. When you get a leg amputated, they call it amputating a leg. So why all the strange language when it comes to cutting someone’s dick off?

[John F. Carr]

Whenever I hear that euphemism I think of Stuart Smalley.

[Malika the Maiz]

Gender-affirming care encompasses a range of interventions, both medical and social, that support individuals in aligning their lives with their gender identity. It aims to help individuals feel more comfortable and aligned with their gender identity, whether through medical procedures, social changes, or other means.
Medical Interventions:
Hormone therapy: May include feminizing hormones (like estrogen) for trans women or masculinizing hormones (like testosterone) for trans men.
Surgery: Procedures such as top surgery (breast reduction or augmentation), bottom surgery (genital reconstruction), and facial feminization or masculinization.
Puberty blockers: Used to delay puberty and allow time for further exploration of gender identity.
Gender-affirming hysterectomy: Removal of the uterus.
Orchiectomy: Removal of the testicles.

[not guilty]

TwelveInchPeckerchecker, male to female transition sometimes, but not necessarily, includes genital reassignment surgery. Why do you insist on conflating the two?

[ObviouslyNotSpam]

There you go again! “Genital reassignment surgery” is just as much an euphemism as “gender affirming care”.

There is nothing to “reassign” because there was no previous “assignment” (yes, yet another euphemism); in nearly every single case there was only the reality of the person’s sex–duly observed and recorded at the time of their birth.

Transism is one area where the right wing bigots make more sense than the orthodox left (albeit for mostly the wrong reasons).

[Malika the Maiz]

Meh, it’s not that strange. Marian has designate as a synonym for assign and has to distinguish as to class for designate (it even links to the definition of class in the sense of biological gender). As medical euphemisms go it’s not much outstanding.

[shawn_dude]

Why are we focused on ensuring humans fit into a tightly defined set of gender norms when both biologically and psychologically we do not and never have. Babies go through gender assignment (no “re”) surgery from time-to-time because their sex cannot be “duly observed or recorded at the time of their birth.” What gender are intersex persons? Certainly not whatever gender the doctor assigns to them on the operating table; how does he know what’s going on in that baby’s head or body?

But none of that matters, really, because the fight over gender identity is about making other people comfortable with someone’s appearance and behavior. It’s not about the actual person themself and how they feel and their mental state. We heard these same arguments around sodomy laws and prohibitions against same-sex marriage–also attempts to force social gender norms on people who didn’t fit them. The solution here is the same: let people be who they are and stop sticking your nose into their personal business. Trans people aren’t obligated to fit anyone else’s ideas about gender and the only thing we should care about is that they have access to the healthcare they need to live happy lives. If that means surgery, so what? It’s not my body, not my life, and not my choice.

[Moderation4ever]

I cannot help but think the Big Beautiful Bill Act (BBBA, and I cannot believe they actually used that name), is another example of a failing Congress. First the BBBA seems to have no end of critics from a wide variety of political, economic and legal views. But bigger than that is the need to dump everything into one bill. I really don’t think this is the way that legislation should be made. Congress is failing and that is the fault of both major parties. Far to many things are left to Presidential EOs rather than being addressed by legislation. Now we have these monstrous bills, like the omnibus bill and the BBBA, that are being moved through as partisan bills. The governmental system carefully crafted by are forefathers seems to be falling apart.

[Kazinski]

Well I agree Congress is broken, we need a filibuster because Congress is nuts and can’t constrain itself.

But the filibuster keeps us from solving the nearly intractable problems we have, because nobody wants to compromise.

[Moderation4ever]

Thank you for saying compromise. It is not a dirty word and it is what the founding fathers expected.

[ObviouslyNotSpam]

Of course they used that name: Trump wanted it. Nothing else matters.

[Moderation4ever]

Not true, Trump first choice was the Boost My Ego Act 2025.

[shawn_dude]

He needed one big beautiful bill because he was unlikely to get more than one chance to implement a lot of his policies. 1) because after the first bill passed, he was likely to start losing too may GOP congresspersons in “purple” districts to pass another one and 2) the bigger the bill the harder it would be for people to read the whole thing and find all the nasty little surprises he had added.

[Frank Drackman]

Great victory by You-Crane with the Drones, let’s see them do that with the ICBMs

[Moderation4ever]

Certainly could be the next thing in warfare. Just take a minute to think of the way simple weapons have been brought to the battlefield. Handheld rockets taking out tanks, drone taking on aircraft, or the Israeli using personal pagers as weapons. Superpowers can afford super weapons, but it seem that far simpler weapons can have bigger impacts.

[Frank Drackman]

Its all fun and games until the Hydrogen Bombs come out, maybe You-Crane is making those too!

[Brett Bellmore]

Hydrogen bombs? I doubt it.

A few fission bombs? I suspect they could pull that off if they really tried. And didn’t mind becoming international pariahs.

[Frank Drackman]

I meant the Roosh-uns will use them, and I was being sarcastic about You-Crane making them, you got a bit of the Ass-Burgers too?

[grb]

Moderation4ever : “Certainly could be the next thing in warfare.”

Here’s my question : If there was a war between major powers, would any of the 13 billion dollar aircraft carriers survive long? I know little about their current defense systems, but I suspect not.

[Moderation4ever]

I would worry about more than aircraft carriers. If there was a war between major powers what would really be left? In the last major war between major powers the US was really invulnerable because weapon system could not reach the US mainland. That is not really true anymore and wars can be taken to anywhere on the planet. We can see the tragedy of localized war in Gaza and in Ukraine. Imagine that warfare spread throughout the world?

[Commenter_XY]

They’re sitting ducks for a determined enemy with a lot of missiles and drones. Their defenses can be overwhelmed with a large enough attack. Or a space based laser system.

[grb]

Per MTG, those Jewish space lasers are particularly fierce!

[Swede425]

When David fights Goliath is how innovations are most likely to occur. Next will be the mitigation piece. Then the counter-mitigation piece. Has been happening since at least the invention of the shield.
I was in Iraq when the Strykers were first deployed in the Mosul and Tikrit areas. RPGs were an immediate threat and could easily defeat the armor. So they put cages around them (quickly) and that did the trick.

[Krayt]

Coward. You look glowingly to Russia-the-hero.

If I’m wrong, please do correct me.

[JoeFromtheBronx]

Back in the day, this blog discussed Justice Scalia responding to a letter about the right to secession. He argued that the matter was settled by the Civil War.

https://volokh.com/2010/02/17/on-justice-scalias-letter-about-secession/

I was reminded about the letter while reading Secession on Trial: The Treason Prosecution of Jefferson Davis by Cynthia Nicoletti. The (non)-prosecution played a small role in the history of the application of 14A, sec. 3.

The book is an interesting account, including a discussion of the various opinions on the value of prosecuting Davis. For instance, many people thought the secession question was settled on the battlefield. Would an acquittal threaten that?

I have seen some people, including a historian on another blog, upset that more rebels were not prosecuted. OTOH, the book cites a speech where Frederick Douglass was willing to let Davis go.

[Bored Lawyer]

“I have seen some people, including a historian on another blog, upset that more rebels were not prosecuted.”

Because sometimes justice has to bend to the greater good. The war was fought to preserve the Union. Lots of prosecution would have made that even harder.

Same reason why Haitian and African dictators sometimes resign and spend the rest of their life on the French Riviera. Justice would demand that they be hanged. But that would mean more suffering in their countries until they got them. So they go into cushy exile. (Then again, they have to go to France. That’s torture enough. 😉

[grb]

I thought the go-to place for disgraced dictators was the Gulf States in the Middle East.

[ObviouslyNotSpam]

Could be worse; could be Russia…

[grb]

I think that’s mainly for poncy British MI6 moles from the 60s, though Snowden is keep’n the dream alive….

[Bob from Ohio]

“I have seen some people, including a historian on another blog, upset that more rebels were not prosecuted.”

The people who actually fought the war thought otherwise, they were more interested in reconciling the south and preventing any guerilla war.

150 years later its easy to be “upset”. I bet the historian thinks he would be the only dude in 1850 Georgia who was an open abolitionist!

[tylertusta]

I have seen some people, including a historian on another blog, upset that more rebels were not prosecuted.

America has a history of being magnanimous with defeated enemies, even people who are nastier pieces of work than ex-Confederates.

Reconciliation was more important than perpetuating a cycle of hatred and rebellion.

[Krayt]

Which isn’t to say politics won’t step up to the plate. There’s the scene in Patton where Patton, in post-WWII Germany, wants to get services running again. Meanwhile there’s a big push on back home to de-Nazify even local governments.

A reporter asks, “But most Germans joined the Nazi party the same way people in the US join the Democrats or Republicans, wouldn’t you say, General?”

Offhandedly, “Yes, that’s about it.”

The reporters smirk at each other knowingly.

Headline: PATTON COMPARES DEMOCRATS AND REPUBLICANS TO NAZIS

[grb]

Patton said a lot of stuff post-war, much of it ill-considered. I think his mouth was a much bigger problem than the media.

[JoeFromtheBronx]

Didn’t have that long — he died in December 1945.

[John F. Carr]

See “The Mouse That Roared.” See. I liked the movie and didn’t care for the novel it was based on.

[Brett Bellmore]

Really? I’ve read the novel, never seen the movie. Enjoyed the sequel more, though.

[JoeFromtheBronx]

I liked the book better. Shrug.

[M L]

Apart from being magnanimous and seeking reconciliation, which saw great efforts on both sides, there is also the fact that nobody in the Lincolnian camp wanted to try the issue of secession in a fair proceeding. They didn’t want to touch that with a 10 foot pole.

[Brett Bellmore]

I’ve always disliked the idea that the Civil war settled that argument. Killing people only settles an argument for as long as people remain confident you’ll kill them.

[M L]

Right. A guy’s wife tried to leave him, but he beat the hell out of her, and that settled that.

[Malika the Maiz]

One thing MAGAns are always and quick to forgive is treason in the defense of slavery. And it might be the one thing!

[Bored Lawyer]

Wow, post-Civil-War Republicans were MAGAns. Trump has a time machine now?

[Sarcastr0]

The comment was in present tense, but nice try.

[John F. Carr]

Consider de-Baathification. Going after a lot of bad guys felt good but did not do good. Prosecuting a thousand January 6 protesters/rioters/rebels/tourists doesn’t compare to punishing a large minority.

[JoeFromtheBronx]

There were “various opinions.”

Also, I’m open to non-criminal justice methods, though not sure if people are consistent in that approach.

Criminal justice had its place, including addressing terror campaigns against freemen after the war. Likewise, if civilian methods to address the “new birth for freedom” were more successful, some might in hindsight be more copacetic about the lack of treason prosecutions of the leaders.

Some of whom didn’t just enjoy life abroad but actively took part in violence and “white redemption.”

[bye]

Joe, there is no right to secession

In the case of Texas v. White (1869), the Supreme Court established that states cannot unilaterally secede from the United States.

I like Scalia but he did not have the gift of First Principles like Alito and Thomas. HE was often right but couldn’t articulate it constitutionally.

He is like a child visited by an angel and then asked to prove there are angels.

[shawn_dude]

I used to wonder how Hitler could rise among good people and convince them to do the unthinkable to millions of innocent people. I stopped wondering that in 2016.

I also wondered why the US didn’t go after the treasonous members of the Confederacy and let the Daughters of the Confederacy and other groups essentially rewrite history to make it seem like an honorable movement. The other day, I saw someone say that they “voted for Trump but not for this,” referring to tariffs and extra-legal deportations of legal immigrants. Pundits, including people like Neil deGrasse Tyson, advocate for toning down the “FAFO” and “I told you so” language in favor of wooing some of the voters to change their minds (and future votes) in the hope we can avoid losing our cohesion as a society and our democracy with it. I think the very same thing must have been going through people’s minds after the Confederacy lost. But here we are, a century and a half later, still effectively fighting the Confederacy.

[Bob from Ohio]

Today is the anniversary of the Battle of Midway. Four minutes that won the war when 3 carriers were sunk.

Many heroes bur especially Wade McClusky who found the carriers by following a stray ship and the pilots and crew who flew obsolete torpedo planes and were all killed except one.

[ThePublius]

Make that four Japanese carriers sunk. On US carrier lost.

In the Battle of Midway, the United States Navy sunk four Japanese aircraft carriers: Akagi, Kaga, Soryu, and Hiryū, as well as the heavy cruiser Mikuma. The United States lost one aircraft carrier, the USS Yorktown, and one destroyer, the USS Hammann.

[Bob from Ohio]

4th carrier was destroyed in a later attack, not the initial few minutes on June 4.

[John 4]

Could you do everyone a favor and just do an inkling of research before you post?

[Ted Chen]

For those that want an animated video of the battle on YouTube. Gives details on the US attack waves and how the Japanese carriers were sunk.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LwnyXs4vkrI&t=54s

That channel also has animated of Guadalcanal battle, which I also found very interesting.

[tylertusta]

Montemayor’s videos on the battle are excellent and worth a watch as well.

[tylertusta]

Wade McClusky was fortunate to have a competent subordinate who pulled his balls out of the fire when it mattered most. McClusky’s mistake at Midway would have been catastrophic had Richard Best not pulled off a hat trick and single-handedly sunk the Akagi.

[Mr. Bumble]

…as is the case in everything when it comes to love and war.
Would there have been a Midway if Japan followed up with a second wave in the attack on Pearl?

[tylertusta]

(Fuchida, ever the rogue, continues to strike again by polluting history with his fanciful tales)

Yes, there is still a Midway. There is also the possibility that the US’s carriers- already at sea- find and destroy the Kidō Butai on December 7th due to them lingering in the vicinity of Hawaii. We might have seen a Midway-sized disaster for the Japanese on the first day of the war instead of seven months later.

First, some historical notes: In English we refer to there being two waves of attacks on ships since they took off and arrived at wildly different times than the first wave. In Japanese accounts, they speak of both waves as one single attack wave. So a “second wave” is an uncommon way of describing follow-on attacks.

Second, a correction: there were no additional waves of attacks planned on Pearl Harbor. This story was concocted solely by Mitsuo Fuchida in his post-war accounts. Other Japanese officers and official records dispute his story, but since he was one of the first to be interrogated post-war and since he was the publish his fanciful tales in English, his fabrication was ingrained in English-speaking history on the battle. Tora, Tora, Tora! was a monument to his vanity.

The Japanese did not plan on a strike against base infrastructure because they didn’t think in those terms. The Japanese were fixated on Alfred Mahan’s theory of the decisive battle, and they simply did not care for or appreciate logistics. They were there to sink the fleet, not to blow up fuel tanks or dockyards.

Third, even if there was a wave dedicated to attacking base infrastructure like fuel farms, it would have likely have proven to be ineffective due to increasing amounts of air defenses around Pearl due to their 2nd wave incompetently targeting battleships. Japanese aircraft cannons could not penetrate the exterior of the fuel tanks, and their bombs would require direct hits on each fuel tank. They simply did not have the time, planes, or resources to conduct meaningful strikes on base infrastructure.

[ducksalad]

Panjandrum of 1943

https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20250603-the-giant-firework-built-to-break-hitlers-atlantic-wall

No need to read the article, the picture explains everything.

[ThePublius]

Here come the sob stories about the terrorist’s poor children who had big dreams before their dad tried burning a bunch of Jews to death in broad daylight.

When do we hear the sob stories of the actual victims, mainstream media?

[jb]

https://abcnews.go.com/US/holocaust-survivor-boulder-attack-victims/story?id=122409895

But, also from another article:

Police liaisons assigned to the victims said none were ready to speak Monday with reporters. They range in age from 52 to 88, and their injuries spanned from serious to minor.

I figured this out in about ten seconds with a Google search because I was interested in learning a little more instead of being mad all the time.

[ThePublius]

Ah, thank you.

[Sarcastr0]

Sins of the father is not how we should do things.

[Bob from Ohio]

They are still illegal immigrants, the crime just brought them to ICE attention

[ThePublius]

NY Times says they were here on VISAs which DHS has revoked.

[shawn_dude]

They came here on a visitor visa and applied for asylum roughly a year before their visa expired. “Illegal immigrant” is propaganda.

So, as a country, are we going to punish the families of criminals too?

[Sarcastr0]

Did you just make that up or what?

[ThePublius]

Bob from Ohio, never talk to the comments police. 🙂

[ThePublius]

I just heard Karoline Leavitt on the radio say that Mohamed Sabry Soliman’s eldest, adult son is here illegally. But then, I just heard her lie, saying that there would be no tax on social security, which is not so. So, who knows.

[bye]

What’s with ‘we’ it is how NATURE does things.
YOu have fetal alcohol syndrome because Mom was a lush.
Really, what are you talking about. This is the way the whole universe works.

[M L]

Assume for the sake of argument these AI folks are correct.

https://www.axios.com/2025/05/28/ai-jobs-white-collar-unemployment-anthropic

Dario Amodei — CEO of Anthropic, one of the world’s most powerful creators of artificial intelligence — has a blunt, scary warning for the U.S. government and all of us:

AI could wipe out half of all entry-level white-collar jobs — and spike unemployment to 10-20% in the next one to five years, Amodei told us in an interview from his San Francisco office.
Amodei said AI companies and government need to stop “sugar-coating” what’s coming: the possible mass elimination of jobs across technology, finance, law, consulting and other white-collar professions, especially entry-level gigs.
…
Steve Bannon — a top official in Trump’s first term, whose “War Room” is one of the most powerful MAGA podcasts — says AI job-killing, which gets virtually no attention now, will be a major issue in the 2028 presidential campaign.
…
Amodei — who had just rolled out the latest versions of his own AI, which can code at near-human levels — said the technology holds unimaginable possibilities to unleash mass good and bad at scale:

“Cancer is cured, the economy grows at 10% a year, the budget is balanced — and 20% of people don’t have jobs.” That’s one very possible scenario rattling in his mind as AI power expands exponentially.
…
“It’s a very strange set of dynamics,” he added, “where we’re saying: ‘You should be worried about where the technology we’re building is going.'” Critics reply: “We don’t believe you. You’re just hyping it up.” He says the skeptics should ask themselves: “Well, what if they’re right?”

I would suggest reading more in the article.

Now assuming something like that is true, what will it mean for this idea that the US can bank on service sector and knowledge jobs for all its people? For decades we have hollowed out our industrial base through trade policy, and declared that every last individual should go to college, spending many of their most energetic years doing “education” (while incidentally academic performance just goes down and down), so they can get some email job or whatever.

All sorts of manufacturing, actually making things, and other forms of working with your hands have long been poo-pooed.

Should this thinking be reevaluated, perhaps it should have been before AI, but particularly in light of recent AI developments?

[grb]

M L : “For decades we have hollowed out our industrial base through trade policy…”

I think your comment / quote is timely and judicious. One quibble is with your quote above. Trade policy is the very smallest factor in the shrinking of our industrial base. More significant would be profit motive and capitalism itself.

[LexAquilia]

The profit motive doesn’t exist because our economic system is capitalist.

It exists because our economic system is made up of humans. I’ve never understood this “profit motive” argument. It’s anti-human.

[Brett Bellmore]

I think the reasoning is that the profit motive would be irrelevant if we had a proper command economy, like opponents of capitalism advocate. That’s more dependent on the “not getting sent to the gulag” motive than the profit motive.

The fact is that at least part of the hollowing out of US industrial capacity, and maybe the largest share of it, WAS driven by government policies.

There was the misguided effort to liberalize China by bolstering their economy, that was pretty big, and all government policy.

There was a push to export “dirty” industries and let the pollution happen someplace else where we could pretend it wasn’t happening.

And, of course, just the general cancerous growth of regulation, and regulatory churn, that drove industries subject to it out of the country.

The thing is, while reshoring industry would in principle help our balance of trade in a post AI world, because even if AI takes over all knowledge jobs you still need physical stuff, it’s not going to do much to reduce the social disruption.

Everybody who does stuff that doesn’t require extraordinary talent, and is common enough/routine enough to gather enough data, is going to end up out of work. And the bar for “extraordinary talent” is going to keep rising.

And physical jobs aren’t going to be exempted, because humanoid industrial robots are starting to march out of the labs onto the production floors.

20% unemployment? That’s where it’s going to start.

And the real social disruption? Income inequality is going to rocket to levels we’ve never seen before, because only two things will retain any value: Extraordinary talent, and owning AI and the factories using it. (Including the farms, which will end up automated.) Everybody else will have NOTHING anybody needs, except their vote.

I don’t think a situation where the only thing government does for the tiny minority of wealthy is convince the teaming masses to not riot and destroy everything is likely to be stable.

The only stable solution is widespread ownership of the AI and automation, so everybody has a share of the pie. And that’s not going to happen naturally, and it’s not going to be politically favored, because the government LIKES income inequality: The wealthy can afford kickbacks, and it’s cheap buying the votes of the poor, it’s the middle class who make life hard if you’re a politician.

[LexAquilia]

A proper command economy doesn’t remove the profit motive, it only restricts those who may pursue it… to the governing elites and their client groups.

I agree with your other points.

[Brett Bellmore]

I don’t disagree with that, I just meant that the profit motive stopped mattering for most people in a command economy, because they’re mostly trying to avoid punishment, not reap rewards.

You know, I really think this is at least part of why western governments aren’t doing much about the birth dearth: Because they see a future where those teaming masses are just surplus, they’re not really contributing anything. And they’re just trying to manage things until that future arrives.

[M L]

Physical jobs are going to be much, much more resistant to AI disruption for a very long time.

Mass production in a controlled factory line setting is one thing. But that’s already been being automated to the max for many decades. Genuine question, how does a large language model or an image generator move the needle on that?

Other physical jobs are in a different category altogether.

You seem like quite an AI alarmist or maximalist. I’m not. My guess i the current thing will be similar to the internet, which is to say very disruptive, but not unmanageable. Technology has been replacing jobs since the wheel, and at some level this isn’t new.

You said “widespread ownership of the AI and automation.” This makes it sounds like there is just one AI and automation. Do you have some reason to think there would be a monopoly/natural monopoly? Why won’t there be a plethora of competing AI technologies, all available at reasonable low cost. That seems consistent with the current direction of things.

[Brett Bellmore]

I think the physical jobs that are routine enough to collect good data on are doomed. Not the ones where it’s different every time. Your plumber is quite secure. Mowing lawns is already largely automated.

I’m an AI maximalist because I understand that, in the end, the only thing that distinguishes us from the apes is our brains, and while AI is continually getting smarter, we aren’t. Eventually it will surpass us, and I think “eventually” is now within a decade or two.

And the idea that we can control something smarter than us has been the basis for a lot of horror stories.

Really, I think our only long term hope is to make “AI” mean “Amplified Intelligence”, and become one with the machines. Keep the motivation to ourselves, and use the machines like hyped up frontal lobes. But everybody seems to want wish granting genies instead.

[bye]

Because of my undergraduate Computer Science degree and my work for companies such as Cigna (which had an AI person) I don’t see this as ‘intelligence’ at all. It is Expert Systems and NLP almost entirely. If ‘ape’ refers to an essence, and “man” to an essence, then a huge number of things distinguish us from them not just intelligence.

You still do not address a consciousness when you use ChatGPT

THis is like Climate Change, the less you know the more fervid the response

[Brett Bellmore]

Oh, no, I agree that the LLM’s are not “intelligence” as humans understand it. They’re more like a huge hyperdimensional curve fitting exercise, where you’re fitting to the products of actual intelligence. That’s why they require such insane amounts of data for training purposes, vastly more than an actually intelligent human would need to exhibit similar behavior. And then hallucinate where the “curve” isn’t a good fit to the data.

They’re showing us how little of our ordinary behavior actually requires active intelligence. You can do a spot on imitation of a human being and most of what we do without a bit of actual understanding, if you’ve got a lot of samples of human behavior to mimic.

But… It is none the less true that AI IS getting more intelligent as time goes by, and we are not.

And for humans, actual intelligence is a sort of exception handling routine, most of the time we operate on no higher level than the LLM’s, really. So even LLM type AI is capable of displacing most human employment.

[bernard11]

Quite a rant, Brett.

But I remember when computers, and automation in general, were going to do that. I guess this time is different.

And no, the “hollowing out” of manufacturing, which is more rhetorical than real is not a disaster caused by over-regulation or foolish trade policies.

[Brett Bellmore]

The hollowing out is quite real, there are whole industries that we used to lead the world in, which we’ve largely abandoned. Like the large forgings used in nuclear powerplants. Or extraction of critical minerals that actually ARE present in the US, like rare earths. Or a lot of steel production, really. Or high end chips.

[M L]

I see what you’re saying. But profit motive, i.e. the mere act of pursuing self-interest, is inherent human nature. Not a policy issue where someone decided, “Ok, today we’re deciding that everyone is going to generally desire money and material gain.”

Capitalism – yes, sort of. By some definitions of the word, a trade policy that offshores industry is part and parcel of capitalism, not a separate thing. Capitalism in some conceptions is a destructive anti-human system of domination and conquest through ostensibly commercial means.

Your comment hints at the general leftwing response which is “OK no problem, just do UBI! And we’ll all live in an idle welfare paradise!” As you might guess my thinking would go in a different direction than that.

[grb]

M L : “Your comment hints at the general leftwing response..”

No; my comment merely points out that trade policy wasn’t remotely close to being the major factor in industrial jobs moving to countries with much cheaper labor. That’s neither a right-wing or left-wing response. It’s just plain common sense.

Of course “trade policy” is still more sensible than Brett above, who apparently believes we gave up manufacturing as a lovey-dovey gift to the Red Chinese. Good Lord above! The things Brett believes!

[M L]

“trade policy wasn’t remotely close to being the major factor in industrial jobs moving to countries with much cheaper labor.”

Of course it was. NAFTA and the giant sucking sound. One might say that big business interests saw the profit to be made in selling out America, and “trade policy” fell in line to allow it.

[David Nieporent]

“Giant sucking sound” was a predictive political slogan by Ross Perot, not a thing that actually happened.

[M L]

It was both. Ross Perot turned out to be correct.

[bernard11]

It was both. Ross Perot turned out to be correct.

You’re a raving idiot who knows nothing about any of this.

You want an idiotic trade policy? I’ll give you one. Trump has raised tariffs on steel to 50%. Now that is idiotic.

Let me tell you a story.

A friend and I run a small business that deals in steel and iron castings, generally components in corrosive manufacturing environments. We advise customers on what kinds of steel they should be using, because it matters a lot, place the orders with foundries known to be reliable, and help the foundries set up their processes correctly. (My friend does the technical work. I’m mostly doing finance and administration.)

Now, one of the foundries we use is in China, so we are importing from there. What do you think this 50% tariff does to our customer? First, it forces him to raise prices substantially. Alternatively, he could switch to a domestic supplier, which may or may not help much (Do you think their prices might rise?).

Besides, foundries are not Amazon or Walmart. You can’t switch suppliers overnight.

Getting the whole thing set up takes time and effort, and money, of course. There are specs to be agreed, drawings and samples to be sent and approved, prices to be negotiated, processes to be established, etc.

You think this is easy? It’s not. It’s disruptive and costly as hell. And who knows when TACO time is coming, and you can go back to importing from China, having wasted a lot of money and time?

Do you have any idea about any of this? No. You just spout the MAGA line.

[ThePublius]

I feel your pain, but you are viewing this, this tariff thing, from your own personal anecdotal perspective, without considering the larger picture – the national picture, the national security perspective, of domestic production. Sure, there is going to be some relatively short term pain and cost associated with this. But on-shoring steel production, and industrial production is vital to national security, and the national economy. We have to make things here. As Ross Perot also said, you can’t generate wealth by shining each others’ shoes. (I would extend that to include ‘generate’ national security.)

[shawn_dude]

You haven’t defined “short term” or “pain and cost” here and the main point that bernard11 is making is that this is grossly underestimated. The current tariff plan is idiocy. If the goal was to rebuild an American steel production network, there are far better ways to go about it. Biden’s approach in the CHIPS and Science Act is an example of how to do it right.

The first step to rebuilding the complex network of skills, resources, and suppliers in the US to restart our dead-and-buried steel industry cannot be to bankrupt steel consumers and put all of their employees on welfare.

[ThePublius]

The CHIPS act? The DEI CHIPS act, that accomplished virtually nothing? Ha, ha. You must be kidding.

[grb]

ThePublius : “You must be kidding.”

No. You must be ignorant:

1. In September 2022, Wolfspeed announced it will build the world’s largest silicon carbide semiconductor plant in Chatham County, North Carolina.

2. In October 2022, Micron Technology announced it will invest $20 billion in a new chip factory in Clay, New York, to take advantages of the subsidies in the Act

3. In December 2022, TSMC announced the opening of the company’s second chip plant in Arizona, raising its investments in the state from $12 billion to $40 billion.[89] At that time, company officials said that construction costs in the U.S. were four to five times those in Taiwan (due to alleged higher costs of labor, red tape, and training) and that they were having difficulty finding qualified personnel (so some U.S. hires were sent for training in Taiwan for 12–18 months)

3. In February 2023, Texas Instruments announced an $11 billion investment in a new 300-mm wafer fab in Lehi, Utah.

4. In February 2023, EMP Shield announced a $1.9 billion proposal for a new campus in Burlington, Kansas.

5. In April 2023, Bosch announced it was acquiring TSI Semiconductors and investing $1.5 billion in upgrades geared toward making silicon carbide chips at the TSI plant in Roseville, California.

6. In June 2023, the French company Mersen, a subsidiary of Le Carbone Lorraine, announced it would spend $81 million on an expansion project in Bay City and Greenville, Michigan due to Michigan’s state implementation of the CHIPS Act

7. In November 2023, Amkor Technology announced they would apply for CHIPS Act funding to build a $2 billion chip packaging and testing facility in Peoria, Arizona, motivated by their work with Apple and TSMC.

8. In January 2024, Microchip Technology announced they had received $162 million in similar grants to upgrade their Gresham, Oregon and Colorado Springs, Colorado plants.

9. In February 2024, GlobalFoundries announced they had received $1.5 billion in similar grants to build a new fab in Malta, New York and upgrade their Essex Junction, Vermont plant

10. In March 2024, Intel announced they had received $8.5 billion from the Act to build four new highly advanced semiconductor fabs in Chandler, Arizona and New Albany, Ohio and upgrade plants in Hillsboro, Oregon and Rio Rancho, New Mexico.

11. In April 2024, TSMC announced they had received $6.6 billion to build a third fab in Arizona, with the intent to host the 2 nm process, and construction slated to begin in 2028.[106][107] The grant was finalized on November 15.

12. In April 2024, Samsung announced they had received $6.4 billion in grants from the Act to invest in additional capacity at its new Texas factory site, which had been revealed to be located in Taylor, and at their existing factory in nearby Austin.

13. In April 2024, Micron Technologies announced a federal CHIPS and Science Act grant of $6.1 billion toward building a new semiconductor chip manufacturing campus in Clay, New York, a northern suburb of Syracuse in Upstate New York, along with a new leading-edge fab in Boise, Idaho

14. In May 2024, the Biden administration and Polar Semiconductor agreed to establish a new foundry creating 160 new jobs in Bloomington, Minnesota using $120 million in CHIPS Act funding.

15. In May 2024, the administration and SK Group subsidiary Absolics announced an agreement to build glass wafers in a new factory creating 1,200 new jobs in Covington, Georgia using $75 million in CHIPS Act money

16. n June 2024, the administration and Rocket Lab announced an agreement to expand production of solar cells in Albuquerque, New Mexico using $23.9 million in CHIPS Act money.

17. In January 2025, the Department of Commerce announced a $325 million award under the Act to Hemlock Semiconductor to help build a new polysilicon crystal factory in Hemlock, Michigan.

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

Why are you always wrong about everything, ThePublius?

[M L]

Nothing you said is news to me. Everything you said should be patently obvious to anyone with a brain and a rudimentary understanding of business or economics.

Now let me tell you another story. I have a client who is moving their own production from China to the U.S. because of tariffs. That’s it, that’s the story. Another client who produces steel parts retained business that the customer was going to move to China because of tariffs.

From a national security perspective, do you think it is wise to rely completely on China or other foreign countries for something as basic as steel? How about microchips?

From an economic perspective, do you think it is wise to totally give up on the more high tech and value added manufacturing areas?

What do you think about this idea generally that the USA doesn’t need to make things any more, we can just be a knowledge and service sector economy, in light of AI developments? Or that we don’t need to export things?

[Bubba Jones]

On the flip side, it will enable countless new companies and mid level jobs that won’t have the economic drag of modern file clerks.

WHERE HAVE ALL THE TYPISTS GONE?

[bernard11]

Exactly.

Does anyone (besides Adomei and ML?) imagine that AI is the end of innovation? That no one but AI programmers is ever going to have a good idea again?

[David Nieporent]

For decades we have hollowed out our industrial base through trade policy,

Once again, this is wrong. Our industrial base is as strong as it has ever been. It is manufacturing employment, not manufacturing itself, that has shrunk. And that’s because of… automation.

[ThePublius]

That’s not true, David. Just use the number of blast furnaces in the U.S. over time as an indicator. Note you cannot make new steel from ore without blast furnaces. In the 1970’s there were over 100 in the U.S. Now there are 12. Sure, you can make steel in electric arc furnaces from scrap steel. But no ‘new’ steel. BTW, in China now there are 247 blast furnaces.

[David Nieporent]

No, let’s not look at the number of blast furnaces in the U.S. over time as an “indicator.” Let’s look at manufacturing output as the actual thing we’re trying to measure.

[ThePublius]

There’s a difference between manufacturing, i.e., mostly assembling, and industrialization. What happens if we get into a shooting war with China? Or if we intercede in a Chinese assault on Taiwan? How do we build ships and other war materiel without Chinese steel imports?

[David Nieporent]

1) I doubt that any shooting war between the U.S. and China would last long enough for shipbuilding to play a meaningful role regardless of our domestic steel industry.
2) Is there a reason that ‘new’ steel is better than the steel from electric arc furnaces, for such production?
3) While Trump is doing his best to destroy world trade (and U.S. alliances!), there are actually a lot of countries other than the U.S. and China.
4) If your complaint is that we need to produce more steel, then you should focus on discussing steel rather than talking about an “industrial base” in the abstract.

[bernard11]

Now assuming something like that is true, what will it mean for this idea that the US can bank on service sector and knowledge jobs for all its people? For decades we have hollowed out our industrial base through trade policy,

No. We have not.

“Cancer is cured, the economy grows at 10% a year, the budget is balanced — and 20% of people don’t have jobs.” That’s one very possible scenario rattling in his mind as AI power expands exponentially.

And who is going to buy all this wonderful stuff if everyone is unemployed? How is the economy going to grow at 10% a year? It can’t. Sure, it’s possible we could produce 10% more cars, for example, but so what? That’s not growing the economy if nobody buys them, and they just sit on lots until they rust.

What manufacturer, human or AI, is going to expend production in the face of 10% unemployment?

Amodei’s article is thoughtless technobabble.

[bye]

I think you both miss the boat.

you are both talking about means without ends.
Leisure is good, IF you use it for true growth and not for ‘the devil’s workshop”
Cancer is cured is good but IF we only cure a disease so people can continue to not live right, it’s a failure. Drugs that help you lose weight are good but not IF they strengthen your undisciplined vices.

[M L]

Note that my comment was, assuming for the sake of argument Amodei is correct – what then? This seems to have escaped you.

Nonetheless I will accept criticisms of the article. And I happen to largely agree with you on that.

[shawn_dude]

Now assuming something like that is true, what will it mean for this idea that the US can bank on service sector and knowledge jobs for all its people?

You need to provide more detail about “this idea” you’ve provided here. Are we to assume that is true as well when it very clearly isn’t?

Today and at least through the near future, AI is going to do no more than any another automation tool that people can use to increase productivity. It’s no different than other forms of automation. It will mean a company will use fewer software developers to build their software but an increase in business analysts and others who are skilled and defining what software needs to be written. AI cannot imagine a new business model and then construct software to implement it–it can only write well-defined functions. Humans will still need to design the software, communicate the work breakdown to staff and AI alike, and then assemble the components into a tested and vetted whole. With today’s AI, software developers have to go into the output and modify variable names (it sometimes changes them mid-function) and add business logic and look-and-feel elements to the result.

New software tech has slowly dissolved the typing pool and reduced the number of administrative assistants because it can quickly automate routine tasks. If I was advising a high school student on which college majors to look at when they apply, I’d only advise the very brightest with interest in AI to pursue computer science because we’re about to have a glut of software developers. But for most of the other science majors, AI is only going expand work opportunities. Also, consider that reducing costs for businesses, as AI will do, can make certain types of manufacturing more competitive in the US and potentially retain and increase our manufacturing base.

[not guilty]

Ras Bakara, the mayor of Newark, has sued Acting United States Attorney Alina Habba and Ricky J. Patel (the Special Agent in charge of the Newark Division of Homeland Security) for malicious prosecution and false arrest and Habba alone for defamation arising out of his arrest on May 9, 2025 outside a private detention facility where the Department of Homeland Security was housing detainees without required inspections or a Certificate of Occupancy from the City of Newark. https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.njd.571808/gov.uscourts.njd.571808.1.0_3.pdf

The complaint looks solid to me.

[LexAquilia]

I don’t think anyone expected you to come to any other conclusion.

[Michael P]

On the one hand, he thinks it looks solid.

On the other hand, he can’t spell the plaintiff’s name.

Hm.

[not guilty]

Oops! Mea culpa!

[John F. Carr]

Habba gets absolute immunity on the decision to bring charges and the government invokes the Westfall Act to protect the defendants on the remaining counts.

[not guilty]

Have you read the complaint? A prosecutor’s absolute immunity does not extend to giving legal advice to police, including advising police to effect a warrantless arrest. Burns v. Reed, 500 U.S. 478, 492-496 (1991). A prosecutor providing legal advice to the police is not a function “closely associated with the judicial process.” Buckley v. Fitzsimmons, 509 U.S. 259, 271 (1993), quoting Burns at 495.

Moreover, Mr. Patel’s submission of a knowingly false affidavit is not protected by absolute immunity. Malley v. Briggs, 475 U.S. 335, 342 (1986). Ms. Habba is alleged at ¶38 to have conspired with Mr. Patel and others to submit such a knowingly false affidavit. It would be anomalous to afford the prosecutor an immunity which is unavailable to police for such conspiracy.

The absence of probable cause here is germane to the absence of absolute immunity. “A prosecutor neither is, nor should consider himself to be, an advocate before he has probable cause to have anyone arrested.” Buckley, 509 U.S. at 274 (footnote omitted).

A prosecuting attorney’s out of court, defamatory statements to the media are definitely not entitled to absolute immunity. “Comments to the media have no functional tie to the judicial process just because they are made by a prosecutor.” Buckley, 509 U.S. at 277.

[Commenter_XY]

John F Carr: This is the People’s Republic of NJ. Different rules apply.

[A Japanese Student]

I thought the only avenue for relief in those cases was a suit against the United States, under FTCA. And even then defamation is not a recognizable claim, only malicious prosecution. (I am excluding Bivens because it’s very likely that will be overturned soon, and is presently hard to win anyway.)

[not guilty]

No, a plaintiff can elect between pursuing a Bivens action and an FTCA claim. First Amendment retaliation consisting of an arrest without probable cause remains actionable under Bivens, per Hartman v. Moore, 547 U.S. 250, 265 (2006).

Hartman should also suffice to defeat any claim of qualified immunity. “Official reprisal for protected speech offends the Constitution because it threatens to inhibit exercise of the protected right, . . . and the law is settled that as a general matter the First Amendment prohibits government officials from subjecting an individual to retaliatory actions, including criminal prosecutions, for speaking out[.]” 547 U.S. at 256 (citation and internal quotation marks omitted).

[LexAquilia]

Sorry :/

[Dr. Ed 2]

https://www.popularmechanics.com/science/green-tech/a64550626/thorium-reactor-nuclear-power/

If these actually (a) work, and (b) are as safe as they claim, why aren’t we building a few thousand of them?

I don’t want to think what temperature liquid salt is at, though…

[Moderation4ever]

Liquid NaCl is 1474 F that really that bad, less than the sir temperature in your car cylinder. Why indeed is nuclear power not a priority? Maybe because the Trump administration is looking backwards at coal and whale oil.

[Zarniwoop]

Molten Salt Reactors are definitely a thing, and have been for a long time.

Let me Google that for Grampa Ed:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Molten-salt_reactor

Of note – China is ramping up to commercial production of Thorium MSRs: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TMSR-LF1

[Kazinski]

They even have molten salt solar, although they’ve been bankrupt a few times, and now mostly operate at night because there is a premium for night solar.

https://www.solarpaces.org/what-happened-with-crescent-dunes/

I drive by the plant a couple of times a year, its an array of mirrors which is focused on a tower with the molten salt heat collector. its pretty wild, but it can fry birds that fly in the focused light, although probably not as many as windmills do.

[Zarniwoop]

neat article, thanks!

[bye]

See, you are fallling into the Biden-REASON trap. What works regardless of who controls

So utterly stupid Biden’s got 31 million acres from BLM (he told you it was for the 30 x 30 program but that’s another story)
and now we get to leach shit from solar panels into millionis of acres. and where do repairs come from

China’s share in global solar PV manufacturing, across all stages from raw materials to finished panels, exceeds 80%. This dominance extends across various key components like polysilicon, ingots, wafers, cells, and modules, with China even potentially controlling over 95% of the manufacturing capacity for certain vital elements by 2025

And then MR Biden’s hatred of national security comes to roost
Rogue communication devices found in Chinese solar power inverters
By Sarah Mcfarlane
May 14, 2025
https://www.reuters.com/sustainability/climate-energy/ghost-machine-rogue-communication-devices-found-chinese-inverters-2025-05-14/

TOTALLY AT CHINA”S MERCY THANKS TO STUPID BIDEN — Don’t join him

[Moderation4ever]

ot sure why you are blaming Joe Biden here? The Crescent Dunes CSP project was granted approval and started construction during the first term of President Obama. That suggests that the planning goes back into the Bush administration.

Are you like President Trump and have such a short memory that you just blame everything you don’t like on the immediate predecessor?

[Zarniwoop]

Something in Popular Mechanics is over-optimistic? What you say!!?!

Where’s my jetpack and flying car?

[grb]

Hey! I have very fond memories of Popular Mechanics from my childhood days in the 60s.

[Moderation4ever]

Loved that magazine.

[JoeFromtheBronx]

There was some discussion about SCOTUS not taking a 2A appeal:

https://firearmslaw.duke.edu/2025/06/scotus-gun-watch-week-of-6-2-25

I don’t think they did a great job trying to do too much. Heller was a bunch of advocacy history (the dissent taking the other side) with little law. They punted in a case involving stun guns.

Eventually, Roberts was like “clean-up on aisle five,” doing damage control with Thomas’s “history and tradition” approach.

Maybe a few swing votes on this issue largely let the lower courts do the heavy lifting since they know their limitations.

[Bubba Jones]

The MD ban wasn’t a good test case. There are lots of MD-compliant black rifles available on the market.

[JoeFromtheBronx]

They avoided taking multiple “test cases” regarding determining what type of guns are protected after two early cases involving handguns (and a stun gun case they punted on).

[Kazinski]

They punted on the stun gun case?

A 9-0 GVR of a conviction is not a punt.
“In a per curiam decision, the Supreme Court vacated the ruling of the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court.[7] Citing District of Columbia v. Heller[8] and McDonald v. City of Chicago,[9] the Court began its opinion by stating that “the Second Amendment extends, prima facie, to all instruments that constitute bearable arms, even those that were not in existence at the time of the founding” and that “the Second Amendment right is fully applicable to the States”

There might be one or two states with bans on the books but I doubt they are enforced.

[ThePublius]

Good point. That was not a punt, at all.

https://www.scotusblog.com/cases/case-files/caetano-v-massachusetts/

[JoeFromtheBronx]

A 9-0 GVR of a conviction is not a punt.

Scalia had died. There were only eight people on the Court when Caetano v. Massachusetts was decided.

Alito and Thomas were also not satisfied by the per curiam, one of many times when the eight justices worked out a compromise.

If you follow TP’s link, the article on the case noted:

“Two Justices filed a separate opinion, complaining that the Court’s opinion was “grudging” in its limited scope.”

The reporter notes, “The Court set aside the state court ruling, and told that tribunal to take another look.”

The title of the piece is “The Second Amendment expands, but maybe not by much.”

Alito and Thomas only concurred in judgment and provided an extended appeal to take the Second Amendment rights much more seriously.

The Supreme Court already held that the 2A applied to the states. Also, it already said it didn’t only apply to arms around at the time of the Founding. That’s just low-hanging fruit.

It was a brief compromise opinion that didn’t do much, punting it back to the state court. That helps explain why few people even remember it being handed down as a 2A ruling.

[tylertusta]

Caetano is only a punt if you squint really, really hard.

In my opinion, the case involved such a blatant violation of Heller that even the liberal Justices couldn’t let it slide. After all, they don’t want conservative district courts ignoring decisions that the left cared about like abortion. As Alan Gura put it, the state supreme court’s ruling was twelve steps too far, and letting it stand would undercut SCOTUS’s authority.

That the case involved stun guns is probably the other reason why the liberal Justices were willing step in and- in principle at least- to police the very outer borders of Heller. The thinking goes that the liberals on SCOTUS don’t want guns to be used in self defense due to a fear of people being killed, so why would they allow a precedent to stand that creates the incentive for people to use deadly force over other means by allowing Massachusetts to outlaw an effective less-than-lethal means of self defense?

The only justification for calling it a punt on the 2nd Amendment was that the Court didn’t decide the merits despite having an ample record from the state courts. Massachusetts took the hint that they had better not poke the SCOTUS bear again, dropped the charges against Ms. Caetano, and amended the state’s stun gun law.

[JoeFromtheBronx]

The people squinting really hard included a veteran Supreme Court reporter and two Supreme Court justices.

It was a short per curiam that sent it back to the lower court without a signed opinion or oral argument. That is often a sign of a punt. And, yes, “didn’t decide the merits” is the point.

The Supreme Court, when it had an eight-person bench, repeatedly compromised with limited compromise decisions. They did so on multiple issues.

They found narrow approaches, including avoiding “blatant” problems. They did some punting.

The fact that stun guns are of limited lethality, perhaps factored into the liberals’ decision-making as much as conservatives might have compromised in other cases, given the limited nature of those rulings.

It doesn’t change the bottom line here.

[Brett Bellmore]

Fanny Hill wasn’t a good test case, there were lots of other books on the market.

The very fact that they arbitrarily banned one out of a multitude of functionally identical arms should doom their ban, not preserve it. It can’t be advancing ANY legitimate government interest!

[dwb68]

Virtue signalling is a legitimate governmental interest

[dwb68]

Left: “The whole “supply-side” business is nonsense on stilts as has been subsequently proven again in some states ”

Also the left: Lets ban guns because supply side disincentives work when it comes to my priorities! Criminals always listen to the law!

[bernard11]

Not clear if you are disagreeing with my statement about supply-side economics.

JFTR, I am not “the Left” and do not speak for “the Left,” nor did my comment mention guns at all.

Could you clarify? Thanks.

[ThePublius]

Just bought a new countertop electric oven, i.e., “toaster oven” that has an air fryer feature.

Has anyone here done any air frying, in particular, fried chicken?

Here’s the one I got:

https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/B0CJMV9RZK/reasonmagazinea-20/

I bought on that was “used but acceptable” for $99. It is unused and perfect, just a damaged shipping carton. So, half price!

Thanks,

[Kazinski]

I use mine for mostly wings and drumsticks. They can get dry unless you flip them and baste them every 10 minutes.

But every air fryer is different. My gas range has an air fryer function and it doesn’t work anything like my Gorilla countertop air fryer.

Here is my fake mole wing sauce marinade and baste:

1/4 cup Frank’s red hot sauce
Heaping teaspoon cocoa powder
Tablespoon of butter.

Marinate an hour then use to baste the wings twice when you flip them.

[Commenter_XY]

The first three times you use it, check your cooking times, start on the low end of the scale and work upwards.

Franks Hot Sauce is the best. Very versatile.

[ThePublius]

Thanks guys. The included recipe book with the oven is weird, in that it doesn’t include fried chicken, but does include things that are trivial to do in a pan, like a Reuben.

[Jmaie]

“Air frying” is useless, especially for fried chicken. The texture of the final product doesn’t come close to actual fried food.

This all started in the 80’s when we became afraid of our food. Thought became, “get rid of any fat, especially animal in nature.” Pork today is 30% leaner compared and it tastes like it, standard center cut pork loin has zero flavor. We’re now seeing “heritage” pork come back into the market and it’s wonderful. And costly.

IMHO lard is the best fat for frying. Great final texture and has the least amount of absorption compared with other oils. (As an experiment I tried frying chicken in a variety of oils and weighing before and after.)

[ThePublius]

How about bacon fat?

[Jmaie]

A delicious alternative but you’ll have to go through a lot of bacon to get enough fat for frying chicken. If lard isn’t available, flavor-wise I’ve had good results using 80% vegetable oil plus 20% bacon fat. You’ll get a bit more absorption than lard, which may be an issue if you’re trying to be heart healthy.

Not to flex, but after 60 years of eating less-than-healthy by USDA standards I had a CT scan done and they found 0% calcification of my heart’s blood vessels. This despite a high LDL/HDL ratio. I highly recommend having this done before denying yourself the pleasure of flavorful food.

As a side note, that process was a window into the health insurance system we have in place. My GP gave me a referral for the test but my insurance company wouldn’t pay unless I had a consult with a cardiac specialist. He recommended I not take the test, so I had to pay it out of pocket. Cost me a whopping $97 and I’ll guarantee that UHC paid several multiples for the consult.

Cheers.

[ThePublius]

Interesting, thanks.

[Commenter_XY]

If you use bacon fat, you simply must go organic; pasture raised, no hormones. Bacon fat is great, very distinctive flavor you can pair with other flavors like coffee, or spices like coriander. If I combine with oil, it is olive or avocado oil (organic). I typically yield 4-6oz of rendered fat when I fry a package of Wegman’s organic bacon. There is much versatility with bacon fat; use sparingly.

Safety warning: Do not open the door with your face near it, for instance when you bend over (or down) to look at contents to see if they are done. There can be a big whoosh of hot air coming out when you open that door; be careful.

[ThePublius]

Thank you. I’ve cooked a lot of bacon and always save the fat. It’s amazing stuff. Doesn’t go rancid, is useful in baking, frying, even drilling holes in steel. 🙂

I have about 48 oz. of it.

I’m not a big organic guy, I’m sure none of mine came from organically raised pigs. I don’t mind, though.

[Mr. Bumble]

Why not go totally organic and use feral hogs?
I find it hard to believe that an otherwise seemingly smart guy has bought into the “organic” bullshit.
It’s like all the food that proclaim themselves to be “gluten free”
Does anyone think mustard would ever contain gluten?

[Magister]

For people with severe allergic reactions to gluten, cross contamination alone could be dangerous. For mustard, it might also depend on what the vinegar is made from. There is sometimes an excessive marketing aspect in food labeling, but clearly identifying allergens (or potential cross contamination) is a good thing.

[ThePublius]

I take your point. However, it is my understanding that the number of people with actual gluten allergies or celiac disease is very small, and that the vast majority of folks who go gluten-free do so as a “nocebo.”

[Magister]

The number of people with non-celiac gluten sensitivity is mostly unknown, so “vast majority” is undoubtedly overreaching. And there should be no issue with food being accurately labeled for the benefit of 1% who are celiac and an unknown number with good reason to avoid gluten, even if some people use that information to pursue an unnecessary dietary restriction; there are much, much crazier dietary fads.

[not guilty]

XY, I didn’t figure you for a bacon fat aficionado.

I recall a joke about a rabbi and a priest asking one another if they had indulged in vices prohibited by their respective faiths.

The rabbi said, “Well, I did once eat a ham and cheese sandwich.”

The priest replied, “On one occasion I strayed and had carnal pleasure with a woman.”

The rabbi quipped, “And I bet that was a lot more enjoyable than my sandwich!”

[Brett Bellmore]

An air frier is just a high temperature convection oven, most of the time. My experience is that actual frying will always beat it in terms of resulting texture.

Though my brother has a propane powered infrared “air fryer” for turkeys, and he swears by it.

[ThePublius]

Interesting. On my new oven the default temp for air frying is 350º – not what I’d call high temperature. But, you can adjust the temp.

I looked into fried chicken. I thought maybe I could do it in my pressure cooker(s). I like the speed, and no oil spray in the kitchen idea. But, NO! Apparently very dangerous to do, explosions, etc. I looked into pressure fryers, but they are quite expensive, like starting around $1,000. There are vintage Wearever low pressure pressure fryers, but I heard they were discontinued for liability reasons, and that essential parts, like gaskets, are no longer available.

That said, I have to give big props to Presto. Great products, and great service on parts. I have two of their pressure cookers, the smaller one of which I got for free and replaced the safety relief and top gasket. The larger one, 6 qt., I got on a crazy sale on Amazon for $41. I’ve made a lot of great dishes quickly with these. The chili was fabulous! And while we’re on appliance makers, I’d also like to give props to Villaware. I have their panini press and waffle maker. Both are rock solid, well made, superb products. Not like that cheap junk you find out there. I guess Williams Sonoma sells VIllaware, but I found mine on eBay.

Yes, I have too much kitchen gadget gear. I wish I had a pressure fryer. 🙂

[ThePublius]

Ha, ha! I just bought a vintage Wear-Ever “Chicken Bucket” 6 qt. low-pressure fryer. It looks like new, perhaps used once or twice, and includes the instruction booklet. I also found I can purchase KFC-like buckets on Amazon, and also a spare gasket for the cooker, if needed. So, when I go to a party or cookout I can bring fried chicken, and also my home-made cole slaw, potato salad, macaroni salad, and maybe even biscuits. 🙂

[Poxigah146]

Look at the posts up above about immigration into the Netherlands, and look at all the left wing judges here looking to force America to keep as many unassimilable migrants as possible. For the “anti racists,” being brown and unassimilable is a positive, not a negative.

[David Nieporent]

There are no unassimilable immigrants — only countries not willing to assimilate them. Of which the U.S. is not one.

[Brett Bellmore]

That’s rather like my son’s joke about how everything is edible… once. By the time you make that statement (tautologically) true, you’ve robbed “assimilate” of all its meaning.

Normally it’s understood to mean the immigrant adopting the values of the destination country. And by that meaning, of course there are unassimilable migrants.

[bye]

This is totally correct. The view you oppose would have to mean that they are “American” even before they leave their country (which in some cases is officially an America-hating country).
The view you oppose is so stupid and blind it might be better to let it fester and stink in front of the folks who have not thought about this before.
The American Founders almost universally stated that to be an American required seeing what new thing the country brought into the world IF the British Loyalists couldn’t see it , I doubt a Maoist Chinese or full-on hating Middle Easterner does , at least initiallly.
SO we don’t kill apostates from Islam for example

[shawn_dude]

A country’s values aren’t monolithic. The US had assimilation issues with Catholics coming into a majority Protestant country and complaining about their kids being taught Protestantism in public schools, for example. That led to the creation of our current private Catholic education system. We have consistently had assimilation issues with immigrants who aren’t “white” for reasons that had nothing to do with “values” as most people define them. Consider that we revoked visas for Afghan families that aided the US military but offered them to white South Africans.

[bye]

From Cicero to the Founding Fathers only one thing makes a person a citizen, the shared values that the nation is based on. Muslims do not accept a whole handful of our basic tenets. YOU ARE WRONG and it’s not an arcane point

[David Nieporent]

MAGA do not accept a whole handful of our basic tenets.

[Mr. Bumble]

“There are no unassimilable immigrants…”
Typical David Notsoimportant bullshit as is his comment directly above.

[ObviouslyNotSpam]

Why did Trump appoint “left wing judges”?

Oh, that’s right, he was “taken advantage of” by Leonard Leo!

[bye]

You seem to make the opposite point to what you think you are making. You would not have been fooled even if Trump was fooled.

[Sarcastr0]

Brown loving lift wing judges!

[ThePublius]

wrong place

[Commenter_XY]

Two dead US hostages (dual citizens) recovered by Israel.

https://www.timesofisrael.com/idf-recovers-bodies-of-slain-hostages-gadi-haggai-judih-weinstein-in-gaza-operation/

The typical terms in that area of the world are surrender or death. hamas leadership appears to want to go down fighting rather than release the hostages and end the suffering of their own people (who have no future in gaza, anyway).

One way or the other, hamas will leave.

[ThePublius]

“President Donald Trump ordered an investigation into Biden’s administration, alleging that top officials used autopen signatures to cover up the former president’s cognitive decline.

“I made the decisions about the pardons, executive orders, legislation, and proclamations. Any suggestion that I didn’t is ridiculous and false,” Biden said in a statement.”

I wonder who crafted Biden’s statement?

I think we should outlaw the autopen for POTUS.

[Mr. Bumble]

“I think we should outlaw the autopen for POTUS.”
Well maybe make an exception for Christmas cards.

[David Nieporent]

I think we should outlaw the autopen for POTUS.

I don’t know how you think you can do that, and in what context. Again, executive orders and pardons don’t require signatures, so saying that one can’t use an autopen to sign them wouldn’t have any effect on their validity. Bills do not require signatures except when Congress adjourns within ten days; banning autopen would therefore have no effect on most legislation. (Even assuming Congress could legislate in the area of legislation/vetoes which actually is part of Article II authority. And if Congress, e.g., passed a law saying that a any future veto signed with autopen rendered the veto invalid, that would be stepping on the judiciary’s terrain.)

I suppose Congress could pass a law making it a criminal offense for any executive official to use the autopen w/o express authorization from the president for each specific signing. (As Bumble says below, it would have to carve out an exception for correspondence.) That might pass muster.

[ThePublius]

“I suppose Congress could pass a law making it a criminal offense for any executive official to use the autopen w/o express authorization from the president for each specific signing. (As Bumble says below, it would have to carve out an exception for correspondence.) That might pass muster.”

I guess that’s what I’m thinking.

[ObviouslyNotSpam]

Now that you mention it, I think I’d probably prefer a housetrained robot than an incontinent moron in the office.

“M.S.1.3”

Has Trump ever “walked back” his repeated claim that Kilmar Abrego Garcia’s knuckles have the characters M, S, 1 and 3 tattooed onto them? Not as far as I can tell. Which suggests that he really does believe that what he was shown in that infamous photo is real. Which, if true, is conclusive proof of serious mental derangement.

I’m not talking about his numerous, obvious mis-statements and gaffes, such as the humdinger about the “revolutionary airports”; this is as much of a part of Trump’s beliefs as his belief that he won the 2020 election.

The only question is, is his TD getting worse?

[shawn_dude]

Meh… Reagan was fully senile in his second term. If we want to reduce the chance of presidents suffering from ailments common to old age we should stop electing presidents in their 70s. I’d be more receptive to the concern that a given president had cognitive decline if the people wringing their hands over it weren’t pretending the current one wasn’t also suffering from cognitive decline both from age and long-term drug abuse. This all reads to me like an attempt to distract people from the impaired idiot in office by pointing to a retired, private citizen and hyperventilating.

[JoeFromtheBronx]

There was a Senate hearing on national injunctions.

VC’s own Josh Blackman was a witness.

https://www.courthousenews.com/senators-trade-barbs-as-gop-deepens-cross-examination-of-judiciary/

Kate Shaw (Strict Scrutiny Podcast) also was a witness.

[Mr. Bumble]

Kate Shaw looked like a fool at those hearings.

[SRG2]

Another moronic appointment by the regime:

A 22-year-old college grad with no government experience is now leading an $18 million terror prevention team

Cultists must be delighted at this appointment of course – he presumably has the only qualification that matters, i.e., personal loyalty to Trump, and so is amply qualified for this position.

[ThePublius]

Maybe you’d prefer KJP? Or Sam Brinton?

Look, I knew a man who, at age 22, was a Major in the Army Air Corps in WWII, and flew 23 missions in B17’s.

I’ll take Trump’s appointments any day over that clown car of idiots Biden had, including cross-dressers, including a luggage thieving cross dresser, AWOL Secretary of Defense, and so on. Or Pete Buttigieg, Secretary of transportation, one of the many Biden cabinet members with no experience for the post to which he was appointed. He likes airports, or some such nonsense. Then he disappears during transportation emergencies, like East Palestine, ’cause he was on paternity leave, “chest feeding” his adopted kid.

Yea.

[Sarcastr0]

But Biden!

[SRG2]

LOL. Did your major join the army as a major after graduating from a local college, and then started flying planes with no training? What a really stipid comparison.

And if you think Biden’s selections were poor how does that justify this selection?

The attitude of you and your fellow cultists continues to be, because someone qualified was incompetent (at least, IYO), we’ll fix that by bringing in someone unqualified.

Every so often one of you cultists posts how Trump has broken someone’s brain. The irony is that it is your brains he’s broken – because that’s what happens when you join a cult.

[grb]

ThePublius : “Look, I knew a man….”

Your dog-like devotion to that sleazy huckster buffoon is pathetic. Just from reading the newspapers, I know a man named head of FEMA who didn’t know anything about the yearly hurricane season. I know a man named head of the Social Security Administration who had to google the position to find out what it does. I know a man named head of HHS who thinks the Germ Theory of disease is a conspiracy by some cabal. Who thinks covid was engineered to not affect Jews. Who believes HIV doesn’t cause AIDS. Or there’s the person who recently ran a scam selling marks pills he claimed were “Mrna detox, reverse the vaxx n get healthy”. This conman now heads the nation’s premier law enforcement agency, the FBI. And though we didn’t get a pedophile rapist as Attorney General, his replacement was chosen because Trump had successfully bribed her in the past. And you want to know the sad irony behind that? Bondi didn’t even get to keep her own bribe. Trump paid her off from his phony charity, and apparently she was too stupid to know politicians can’t accept money from charities (not even fake ones). She had to return her own bribe – which I’m sure a criminal like Trump found amusing.

Have you whored-away every last ounce of integrity you ever possessed, ThePublius? Is tongue-polishing Trump’s shoe leather that fulfilling for you?

[grb]

Speaking of performance whores, it seems Musk has learned his run of tech-bro prankster trolling for Trump came with a price. These two overgrown children – one drug-addled and the other mentally ill even before the recent signs of cognitive decay – are now at each other’s throats. Trump is threatening to pull all government contracts with Musk companies. Indeed, our Toddler-in-Chief proclaimed this :

“The easiest way to save money in our Budget, Billions and Billions of Dollars, is to terminate Elon’s Governmental Subsidies and Contracts. I was always surprised that Biden didn’t do it!”

Trump’s surprise shouldn’t surprise anyone. As much as Musk yipped and bit at Biden’s ankles, he still provided services good for the country. That Biden put the country first is something well beyond Trump comprehension. Meanwhile, the other terrible-two in this playpen squabble is threatening to withdraw all SpaceX services for the country.

And – of course – the United States is the laughingstock of the world.

[grb]

A follow-up from the Onion :

“Rift Widens Between Elon Musk, Anyone Who Ever Met Him”

https://theonion.com/rift-widens-between-elon-musk-anyone-who-ever-met-him/

(though maybe Stephen Miller’s wife is an exception)