Monday Open Thread

What's on your mind?

Comments

[not guilty]

A guest essay in the New York Times describes the dubious efforts that various governments are taking to increase birthrates. https://www.nytimes.com/2025/06/15/opinion/birth-rate-parenting-natalism.html Remarkably absent is any discussion of why women of childbearing age choose to become brood mares or not is any of the government's freaking business.

[Kazinski]

Its an important issue for countries, for one there is an inverted correlation between median age and economic growth rates. And of course there are other factors effecting that, but there is a relationship.

Then you need younger people working to pay into our ponzi scheme pension systems.

It certainly is a rational desire to want to have higher birth rates.

[AmosArch]

Judging by the contempt for parents and children that oozes through the post he probably went to the same bar as the Palm Springs bomber. He's one of those people.

[not guilty]

Ay contraire. I'm all for parenthood. I just believe that it is up to the prospective parents to decide.

[AmosArch]

The article is paywalled but I haven't heard of any significantly large program of strapping down women and raping them to force them to have children outside of leftist fantasy tv shows and movies.

[Dr. Ed 2]

What we could do is what was done to men in Colonial times -- charge them a significant tax if they are not married. Maybe also if they are childless.

[Frank Drackman]

or how they abandoned retarded children in the Wilderness, see ya later Ed!

[Supremacy Claus]

Thank the lawyer profession for destroying the white American family. This is after it destroyed the Black family. Now Muslims and Third World families will overrun our country demographically.

The black family survived unbelievable stresses. It did not survive the lawyer. Before the lawyer got a hold of it, it survived abduction, slavery, war, lawyer Jim Crow, lawyer genocidal maniac campaign by the lawyer founded KKK, lawyer instituted discrimination. Social pathologies were 10% higher than that of the whites until the 1970's. Now they are 400% higher, thanks to the lawyer profession.

Today, only an insane, suicidal male would ever get married. The odds are close to 100%, marriage will take all his assets and destroy his life, thanks to the lawyer profession. I used to think, the law was biased against males. Then I spoke to a female doctor. What an ordeal. The law is biased against productive people and their assets. It is to plunder them. After her divorce and personal destruction, the female judge invited her lawyer ex-husband on a date. She had gotten to know him, I suppose. I asked if she wanted me to file complaints against both. The doctor wanted to try to forget.

Family court judges must be severely punished for their rapid fire misconduct, stupidity, and injustices. The lash by an effective Judicial Review Board comes to mind for these little tyrants. It can be repeated until they stop their inane, ruinous tyrannies.

[Dr. Ed 2]

Frank, can you document children being abandoned in the wilderness?

[Stella Link's Ghost]

Perhaps he has personal experience.

[Mr. Bumble]

Maybe he was referring to Native Americans?
Native Americans

In the Eastern Shoshone there was a scarcity of Native American women as a result of female infanticide.[145] For the Maidu Native Americans twins were so dangerous that they not only killed them, but the mother as well.[146] In the region known today as southern Texas, the Mariame Native Americans practiced infanticide of females on a large scale. Wives had to be obtained from neighboring groups.[147]
Wiki

[DeAnnP]

Not there quite yet, but this is a disturbing incident...

https://www.npr.org/2025/05/21/nx-s1-5405542/a-brain-dead-womans-pregnancy-raises-questions-about-georgias-abortion-law

[Joe_dallas]

NPR omitted lots of pertinent facts

[jb]

Lately Joe seems to be really interested in telling us about all the information we are missing without actually linking to or even summarizing that information. I guess the pertinent facts will remain a mystery to those of us that don't read the exact same news sources as Joe.

[Joe_dallas]

JB - Confirming you chose to remain uninformed.

fwiw - there is considerable background information readly avaible. Try google

[jb]

Okay, I went and read every link from the first page of Google results for "georgia abortion law braindead woman". Of all the results, the NPR story seems to have the most information and none of the results seem to have materially different facts than the ones that are included in that story.

The local Fox station has a piece that is probably the second most comprehensive:

https://www.fox5atlanta.com/news/brain-dead-georgia-woman-kept-life-support-due-states-abortion-law

I don't think it adds anything significant to NPR's reporting, though.

So please help us a little and explain what we're missing.

[Joe_dallas]

jb -
Both stories omit how she got to that stage - several medical errors unrelated to the pregnancy

[jb]

Okay, here's a story that includes more details about how she became brain dead:

https://www.today.com/health/womens-health/brain-dead-mom-forced-life-support-pregnancy-rcna206994

Definitely it sounds like she could have received better treatment. Less clear about why you think that might change how we should think about her body being kept alive as an incubator despite her family's wishes otherwise.

[Nelson]

I believe that “pertinent” is doing all the lifting here. Most likely what Joe thinks is “pertinent” is what most people call “irrelevant” or “personal opinion” or “intentional mischaracterization”.

[David Nieporent]

Or "whatabouting."

[DeAnnP]

What facts are missing? I will tell you what is not missing, a woman who was 9 weeks pregnant died. They are using her body as an incubator. That's some sick stuff right there. I cannot imagine any "omitted" facts that would change that.

[bye]

But that says nothing about the stability of the relationship, abortion, the right of kids to be raised by their biological parents. IN fact it is a non-statement. Whatever the case , THEY IN FACT DO DECIDE.

I doubt you are "all for parenthood" , you seem to exalt freedom over use of freedom.

[Stella Link's Ghost]

I've read that there are actual practitioners who seem to think that the space-comma is acceptable punctuation, but have never personally encountered such a being. Until now. Amazing.

[Riva]

"All for parenthood" you unbalanced clown? And yet you derisively and disrespectfully refer to mothers as "brood mares" You clowns are beneath contempt.

[Michael P]

De-personing people he disagrees with is part of the point.

[ObviouslyNotSpam]

Or immigration rates...

[AmosArch]

Mass migration and open borders is certainly one way to solve declining population rates. At least in the short term and its a solution many have embraced. Unfortunately it sometimes tends to have the drawback of transforming a country into whatever place the migrants fled from. So many others would like to continue to live in the same place prefer to increase the native birthrate.

[ObviouslyNotSpam]

I referred to "higher immigration rates", but you still managed to read it as "mass migration and open borders".

This is why the US population will continue to live in the same place, and its population will continue to contract. What's Plan B?

[AmosArch]

Unlike some on the right I agree that the real issue is a lot deeper than dirty foreigners coming to take all the jerbs. Its merely a symptom of the corrosive effect of postmodern postindustrial society on the integrity of the family. Open borders or not, its not really going to matter if we don't confront the true problem.

Or we can just give up. As the Malthusian contrarians that have been popping up recently are saying the population contraction may not necessarily be completely fatal. At least not in the short term and might even appear to have some benefits. Humanity is pretty adaptable after all and skilled in turning lemons into lemonade. But the trap in this sort of thinking is just because you get through it or appear to... doesn't mean it was the right path...

but at any rate I oppose relying on immigration as a crutch to avoid dealing with the problems that prevent healthy families and the growing dynamic population that is central to the survival and prosperity of humanity because it is the illusion of a solution.

[bye]

You come off so hillbilly when you unnecessarily add "unlike some on the right". Do you think every immigrant is a leftist. This was enough for me to ignore you.

The illusion is in treating a moral problem like an algebra problem
Divorce is at 50% , getting more divorcing parents is no solution at all

What about our Founders ....
the American Founders placed marriage as the cornerstone of republican liberty. The Founders’ vision of marriage relied on a liberalized form of marital unity that honored human equality, rights, and the beauty of intimate marital love. .... Founders at the state and national level shaped marriage law to reflect five vital components of marital unity: the equality and complementarity of the sexes, consent and permanence in marriage, exclusivity in marriage, marital love, and a union oriented toward procreation and childrearing.

[Nelson]

“ The illusion is in treating a moral problem like an algebra problem
Divorce is at 50% , getting more divorcing parents is no solution at all”

Only if you erroneously assume that divorce has an absolute moral character. If you assume divorce is sometimes good, sometimes bad, and usually a mix, increases (or decreases) in the divorce rate are just an interesting factoid, like the highest or lowest temperatures on a given day or the actual name of the paint color you chose for the living room.

[Kazinski]

I've always advocated copying Hong Kong's work visa program where they allow work visas for single woman, which are renewable as long as they are employed.

Woman have much lower crime rates than men, and lower instances of substance abuse as well, and they are also easier on the eyes.

Hong Kong has a permanent population of 7.5 million, and a about 400,000 foreign domestic workers mostly Filipino and Indonesian women under 40. Of course we should relax the occupation restrictions to allow them to work in day care, nursing homes, hospitals, etc.

Its amazing how importing an additional 5% of the population who are young single women can brighten up a place. And if they end up dropping a few kids and staying I am ok with that.

[Sarcastr0]

Creepy.

[Brett Bellmore]

And that, too, is part of the problem: As a lower and lower percentage of the population actually bothers to reproduce, an ever larger part of the population starts to view everything associated with reproduction as alien and disturbing. Starts treating actually producing the next generation of humanity as a weird hobby.

And we don't go out of our way to accommodate, let alone subsidize, weird hobbies.

[Sarcastr0]

I’m not being sex negative. I’m saying women are people don’t talk about them like a commodity.

I also think this whole looming crisis narrative is overblown. The trends of today are not always the trends of tomorrow.

It has as much of controlling women’s reproduction as any real problem.

[Kazinski]

Karen Bass just said without exploiting immigrants our economy will collapse:

https://www.youtube.com/shorts/UZKkDZXq-QU&ved=2ahUKEwjOiMud5vWNAxVWIEQIHcoUOXIQwqsBegQIEBAE

And I am not talking about women like they are a commodity, each one is unique and should be treasured, and we should have a temporary work visa program so they aren't raped multiple times coming to America.

[Brett Bellmore]

" The trends of today are not always the trends of tomorrow."

Identify a single country that's gone significantly below replacement and then gotten back up to replacement.

[Sarcastr0]

Kaz - not sure how 'immigration is a keystone of our economy' is the same as 'American women so many babies now or all is desolation!'

Brett -
1) I can do overdetermined questions too! identify a country that's gone below replacement and then completely died out.
2) You're not arguing America, you're arguing HUMAN EXTINCTION!!!!!! Drama pants don't come off that easy.

[Kazinski]

Those weren't my words at all.

I knew you weren't a very careful reader, you just pick out a word or two and run with it usually. But please make.sure at least one of the words are mine.

[Nelson]

“ And we don't go out of our way to accommodate, let alone subsidize, weird hobbies.”

Do you believe we should subsidize children? I think it’s not something that other taxpayers should be on the hook for.

[bye]

Naah, in that part of the world any drip of improvement is offset by the enormous gendercide.
https://invisiblegirlproject.org/
We want a future in India with girls in it.
63 million girls are missing from India’s population. Join us in ending female gendercide!

Maybe my favorite charity

[bye]

NO, you missed your own point. There is national decline and there is world decline and saying immigrants can help means you ignore the world decline, the most destabilizing of all results.

[Nelson]

“ Unfortunately it sometimes tends to have the drawback of transforming a country into whatever place the migrants fled from.”

I understand that it is a paleocon article of faith that this is true, but it has actually never happened in the entire history of this (or any other) country. It’s Chicken Little fearmongering.

“ So many others would like to continue to live in the same place prefer to increase the native birthrate.”

And how, exactly, would that be accomplished? If someone doesn’t want to have children, they won’t have children.

[AmosArch]

Civilization as we know it cannot exist without people. This is not rocket science. Technically anything the government can think to try to encourage is none of their business. Like why should a government spend so much effort forcing children to go to school when I'm pretty sure the majority would rather not. Its the kid's own life so what business is it of a distant bureaucrats?

[Krayt]

The mass immigration was liked by both parties, as it put off Social Security probs by another generation. Then people made hay over it, and here we are.

[Brett Bellmore]

Almost everything the federal government does these days is none of it's business, it seems weird to suddenly care when the government decides to make an existential threat of human extinction its business.

[Sarcastr0]

Oh hey Brett found another exception to libertarian principles.

It’s cause there is a crisis again.

[Brett Bellmore]

More like I found a really weird exception to your statist principles.

[Sarcastr0]

Statist? You're arguing for government intervention to make with the babies. Cause it's a crisis, of course. Just like the debt. Or the libs planning to put you in camps. Or the illegals about to take over.

You don't count as a libertarian if you gin up crisis after crisis to excuse your selective love for certain big government authorities and programs.

[Brett Bellmore]

To be clear, my own opinion is that the birth dearth is due to a common policy adopted by almost all even moderately advanced countries, old age pensions. Which create the illusion that you personally don't need to go to the expense and trouble to contribute to their being a next generation.

But it's only an illusion, old age pensions rely on there being a next generation, they only decouple your personal situation from your own personal efforts to make sure that happens.

This isn't just my opinion, mind you. Ironically, the link was first discovered by researchers who were trying to REDUCE birth rates, and advocated old age pensions in developing countries to accomplish that!

As a problem largely created by government, it isn't unlibertarian to think government needs to fix, or at least stop causing, it.

[Sarcastr0]

Societies care for their old an infirm.

You can join other people in having a badly supported opinion, but it might be better if you did some work to establish the causal element is someone to care for you when you're old.

[Brett Bellmore]

You do understand, I hope, that a policy can be entirely admirable in its intent, and yet none the less have major negative consequences. The association between instituting old age pensions and dropping birthrates is pretty strong, statistically, and makes sense in terms of normal human motivations.

Maybe if you weren't so determined to deny that policies you like can have negative consequences, you'd consider exploring ways those consequences could be ameliorated.

[Sarcastr0]

I absolutely understand unintended consequences of a policy can be a thing.

I also understand that you should prove the policy caused the consequence your positing.

And no, and 'association' doesn't cut it.
Since pensions are associated with being a more developed country there are a ton of potentially confounding variables.

You never want to do the work to prove causation once you get a narrative you like.

[bye]

Sure, with a myopic unhistorical look at things....

the American Founders placed marriage as the cornerstone of republican liberty. The Founders’ vision of marriage relied on a liberalized form of marital unity that honored human equality, rights, and the beauty of intimate marital love.

Founders at the state and national level shaped marriage law to reflect five vital components of marital unity: the equality and complementarity of the sexes, consent and permanence in marriage, exclusivity in marriage, marital love, and a union oriented toward procreation and childrearing.

[not guilty]

An existential threat of human extinction??

Give me a break!

[Nelson]

“ an existential threat of human extinction”

Well that doesn’t sound hysterical or hyperbolic. At all. No, really.

Side note: Brett, I believe your friend Chicken Little is using your account.

[Nelson]

“ Civilization as we know it cannot exist without people.”

Without any people, sure. But how many do we need to sustain civilization? Less than we have now isn’t going to trigger a dystopian hellscape.

“ It’s the kid's own life so what business is it of a distant bureaucrats?”

Well, as proved by the various red states that suckle on the federal teat, low education levels and low prosperity are directly related. The least educated states (largely red states) are also the least successful. Those states are the welfare queens of federal aid.

So, from a federal budget perspective, it matters a lot if we have more, not less, ignorant people. Ignorant people are a net drain on the economy. Sure, less ignorance means less cultural conservatives trying to shove their values down everyone else’s throats, but that’s just another benefit.

[Commenter_XY]

First, women who voluntarily choose to have children are not brood mares. Is your Mother a brood mare, NG? I think not.

I don't have a problem with governments trying to encourage nuclear families using voluntary programs geared toward Mom and Dad living under the same roof, rearing their children. That promotes societal stability. We do it in the tax code, no?

[Nelson]

Marriage and a nuclear family are neither inherently stable, nor superior to other family arrangements (including biological parents living together without getting married). There is no identifiable benefit to a nuclear, heterosexual family. It has great PR from the religious types, but those are the ones who also act like apologists for the constant sexual predations of religious figures and organizations so you can’t take their word as to what’s “good”, since according to them child rapists shouldn’t be turned over to authorities for prosecution and imprisonment.

And yes, we do screw over those without kids and those who aren’t married in the tax code. That doesn’t make it right. Everyone should pay their fair share, with no consideration to whether they are married or have children.

[JoeFromtheBronx]

https://archive.ph/qrJgs

Reproductive choices ultimately should be up to individuals.

Governments reasonably still have some concerns about population numbers. They can affect public well-being.

Also, if a government is concerned about parenthood, the op-ed discusses ways to go about it, including ways that help the parents and families involved.

Such issues will be a factor in government policy aimed at promoting the general welfare. As the op-ed asks, "So what do America’s women actually need?"

[bye]

Joe, this is classic arguing against yourself. All your major points are wrong.

1) This was not the view of our Founders at all ...Founders at the state and national level shaped marriage law to reflect five vital components of marital unity: the equality and complementarity of the sexes, consent and permanence in marriage, exclusivity in marriage, marital love, and a union oriented toward procreation and childrearing.

2) Well-being !! When we have a 50% divorce rate... General welfare is in no way distinct from that. And your "up to individuals " caused this. Here is what that view did to the Black Community

the poverty rate among blacks fell from 87 percent in 1940 to 47 percent by 1960. This was before any of those programs began.

Over the next 20 years, the poverty rate among blacks fell another 18 percentage points, compared to the 40-point drop in the previous 20 years. This was the continuation of a previous economic trend, at a slower rate of progress, not the economic grand deliverance proclaimed by liberals and self-serving black “leaders.”

…..

Nearly a hundred years of the supposed “legacy of slavery” found most black children [78%] being raised in two-parent families in 1960. But thirty years after the liberal welfare state found the great majority of black children being raised by a single parent [66%].

3) IN A NUTSHELL

Senator ( and huge liberal)_ The steady expansion of welfare programs can be taken as a measure of the steady disintegration of the Negro family structure over the past generation in the United States.

Daniel Patrick Moynihan

And , Joe, what do women really need?
https://feministsforlife.org/taf-2/

[JoeFromtheBronx]

The Framers worked under the rules of coverture and other marriage rules we no longer follow. So, that doesn't help TOO much.

You can debate how to handle current well-being and the nature of the situation but not seeing a refutation it is something to take into consideration when crafting government policies.

There is ground for agreement between the two sides in the abortion debate & they have agreed on certain things.

Banning abortion will not be the best net approach there. Overall, instead of doing that -- which will have a limited overall effect on the abortion rate -- it would be better if they push for things the sides can agree on or some they might not (birth control etc.).

[jb]

The divorce rate has been declining since 1980 and the fertility rate has been pretty level to somewhat declining.

If you actually pay attention to what young people are saying, it's that they can't afford to have children even if they're interested in doing so. Housing costs, health care costs, and student loan debt increases combined with stalled real wages for decades means that young people don't feel like they are in a position to start families.

Just look at the median age of homebuyers these days: it's 56! It was 45 just 4 years ago, and early 30s 40 years ago. There's been a lot of talk about economic inequality but not nearly enough attention has been paid to generational equity.

[Brett Bellmore]

"The divorce rate has been declining since 1980"

Hard to get a divorce if you never marry in the first place...

[Nelson]

And why is choosing not to get married bad?

[jb]

You know the divorce rate is as a fraction of married couples, right?

[Nelson]

The number one cause of divorce is marriage.

[Nelson]

“ When we have a 50% divorce rate”

Marriage is a voluntary arrangement between two people. Opposing divorce, where one (or both) no longer wish to associate with the other, is about as anti-liberty and anti-freedom as it gets. You don’t like divorce? Great, don’t make your spouse want to leave. But why should everyone else be forced to live by your moral beliefs? Because divorce isn’t morally good or morally bad. It has no moral dimension.

[TwelveInchPianist]

"Opposing divorce, where one (or both) no longer wish to associate with the other, is about as anti-liberty and anti-freedom as it gets."

Certainly true. And I assume you mean complete divorce, including financial ties, regardless of label, correct?

[Nelson]

Correct. If there is a divorce, everything should get split down the middle. All child expenses split 50/50 regardless of custodial parent. No alimony. Certainly no “lifestyle to which they have become accustomed” nonsense.

[TwelveInchPianist]

Agreed. Maybe some day we'll get around to permitting divorce in this country, but I don't see a lot of support for it.

[Nelson]

Like policies like affirmative I’ve action, they were created when the situation was different. With the barriers to women in college and the workplace that existed at the time, things like alimony prevented women from choosing between destitution and a miserable husband/marriage/life. The situation has obviously changed, but laws always change slower than society (which, itself, changes very slowly).

[Brett Bellmore]

"Brood mares"?

Let's suppose that a virus came along that caused a huge decline in human fertility. Would THAT be any of the government's freaking business? Judging by previous comments, I'm guessing yes.

Now suppose some policy government innocently adopted a couple generations back was the cause. Suddenly not any of the government's freaking business?

We're looking at an existential threat, and the longer we put off solving it, the more extreme the solutions will be. And maybe you'd prefer "Brave New World" to huge tax breaks for people who actually reproduce, but most people think BNW was a dystopian novel.

[Stella Link's Ghost]

"We're looking at an existential threat, and the longer we put off solving it, the more extreme the solutions will be. "

There is no shortage of people in the world. Current population is somwhere in excess of 8 million and is rising. Population is expected to reach about 10 million in 50 years.

So, what is this "existential threat" that we shouldn't put off solving? I suspect that I know the answer.

[Brett Bellmore]

You're still reacting you yesterday's anti-natal propaganda, not today's reality.

Yes, the population is still rising, just barely. We're like a plane that was in a steep climb, and then the engine died: For a while you continue climbing on momentum, but that doesn't erase the fact that your freaking engine died.

Every developed nation in the world is below replacement. The only reason the population is, just barely, still rising, is a rapidly shrinking number of poor countries where people are still having children.

So, what's your answer to impending human extinction? We deliberately keep a large chunk of the world poor and pre-modern, so that they don't stop reproducing? And then just import people from them?

Setting aside that not working because we'd become poor and pre-modern ourselves if we got all our new adults from poor, pre-modern countries, that would be grossly immoral.

We have to figure out how wealthy countries can maintain replacement levels of birth, not just use the (shrinking) third world as a baby farm.

[Sarcastr0]

Fucking extinction? Melodrama.

With some anti natal propaganda conspiracy flavor for spice,

[Stella Link's Ghost]

"With some anti natal propaganda conspiracy flavor for spice,"

It's always a conspiracy. In this case, a conspiracy involving the pro-extinction lobby.

[Brett Bellmore]

No, it's not melodrama, it's simple extrapolation.

List of countries by total fertility

Low income countries: 4.38

Middle income countries: 2.09 (That's about replacement.)

US: 1.62

Upper middle income countries: 1.48

High income countries: 1.47.

I'll say it again: Every advanced nation is below replacement. Every single one. And even the undeveloped nations are trending down, now, so they're not going to be available to make up the shortfall for much longer.

Now, this is not likely to go on forever, because the future does belong to those who show up for it. But the question is, exactly HOW does it stop going on forever?

The longer and deeper the decline gets, the more extreme the social changes necessary to restore replacement level fertility. The real concern here is that, by the time to will exists to do more than meaningless gestures towards restoring fertility, nothing sort of the stuff of dystopian novels will be sufficient to do the trick.

This is very much a case where the sooner we act, the less extreme the acts must be.

[Stella Link's Ghost]

"This is very much a case where the sooner we act, the less extreme the acts must be."

Even if you are correct that current population trends lead inexhorably to extinction, the likely timeline is hundreds of years, at least.

[Brett Bellmore]

No, if continued they would lead to extinction, but they won't be continued, because eventually if nothing else happens, whatever minority don't stop reproducing will dominate the population. But since the rest of the people can make it hard for them, too, to reproduce, it can go on an awfully long time.

My actual concern is twofold.

First, the distortions to the population pyramid caused by low birth rates will be very disruptive.

And, second, by the time it gets bad enough governments are willing to take effective action, we're looking at actions that resemble dystopian novels, not free societies.

[Sarcastr0]

According to current trends, I will never die.

This is extremely silly.
Arguably a symptom of your consistent overconfidence in the truth value your personal extrapolations, not seeing how outcome oriented they are.

[David Nieporent]

No, it's not melodrama, it's simple extrapolation.

Yes; that's why it's dumb. "The population is will soon be declining" cannot be legitimately "extrapolated" to "humanity will go extinct," any more than earlier population growth could be "simply extrapolated" to "the population will reach ∞."

We only need to "restore replacement level fertility" if the current population level is the one we need in perpetuity.

[Brett Bellmore]

We have multiple countries at well below 1 child born per woman, a fertility level normally only seen for brief periods in war zones and during plagues and famines. This is literally unprecedented in human history.

And there's no sign yet that any nation has recovered normal fertility rates after dropping below replacement.

The fact that it's happening slow enough to not be easily perceptible doesn't mean it isn't an emergency. Like I said, by the time governments actually do decide to do something serious about it, the only options that will be able to solve the problem will be "Brave New World" dystopian solutions, like literal baby factories.

[David Nieporent]

We have multiple countries at well below 1 child born per woman,

Wikipedia, citing the U.N. in 2025, lists exactly 3 countries with fertility rates below 1 — South Korea, Taiwan, and Singapore. South Korea, at 0.75, is the only one "well below" 1. (I guess YMMV as to whether Taiwan's .86 is "well below" 1.)

The Wikipedia entry — https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_total_fertility_rate — has several different charts compiled by different organizations, covering slightly different years — so that's open to minor dispute. (For example, the CIA World Factbook lists none below 1, let alone "well below" 1. But it agrees on the ordinal ranking, putting those three at the bottom.)

[Stella Link's Ghost]

"You're still reacting you yesterday's anti-natal propaganda, not today's reality."

Bullshit on three counts. You're going strong this morning.

"Yes, the population is still rising, just barely."
Population is expected to increase by about 25% in the next 50-60 years. That's a bit more than "barely," even if the world's self-declared geniuses can't figure it out.

"So, what's your answer to impending human extinction? . . ."

There is no "impending human extinction."

"Setting aside that not working because we'd become poor and pre-modern ourselves if we got all our new adults from poor, pre-modern countries, that would be grossly immoral. "

Where do you think "we" got all our immigrants from in the great migration of the last half of the 19th century through the first half of the 20th? We know who the were, we know how and why they came. Those "huddled masses yearning to breathe free,. .. . that wretched refuse" included every one of my great grandparents and the ancestors of millions and millions of your countrymen -- perhaps even yours. It doesn't appear to me that those poor, pre-modern, uneducated immigrants fleeing poverty and famine resulted in poverty and a pre-modern nation.

As for "immoral," the world does not need morality lessons from the likes of you.

[bye]

stella, the stupidest statement I've seen in years : There is no shortage of people in the world !! Actually the very numbers increasing so lopsidedly is a HUGE problem

https://www.gendercide.org/case_infanticide.html

Invisible girl project
We want a future in India with girls in it.
63 million girls are missing from India’s population. Join us in ending female gendercide!

CHINA
according to official estimates, there are currently 34 million more males than females in China. Demographic experts have warned that China’s large number of “surplus males” could lead to societal instability, higher crime rates and sexual violence, and increased trafficking of women and girls.

I am depressed by your comment

[Stella Link's Ghost]

"I am depressed by your comment"

I'm glad to hear that. A productive day and so early.

[not guilty]

Straw manning much, Brett?

[bye]

You degrade motherhood -- on Fathers Day (nice move) but when you are an old spinster complainer and die in your unvisited house (as happens in Japan) you won't at least despise your own mother, just yourself

Kodokushi (孤独死) or lonely death is a Japanese phenomenon of people dying alone and remaining undiscovered for a long period of time

[hobie]

A lot of my women friends in Texas have been saying that they cannot risk pregnancy anymore because if something goes wrong medically they are screwed. So they just avoid men and dating now.

It's a little bit like Russia where abortion is legal, but the men are so toxic (alcoholics/dominants/Vance) that almost 50% of women there are now lesbian. The birth rate there is now so dire that the country is facing collapse in two generations...just like red America

[Brett Bellmore]

Wait, your women friends are part of red America?

[hobie]

Of course; I'm from Texas. I mean, yeah, you'll still find a few drunk redneck chicks stumbling out of Gilley's ready for a pregnancy, but the rest are vanishing

[Brett Bellmore]

I thought you lived in the hood?

[hobie]

I do now. Inner city Cleveland, baby! How the fuck did I end up here?!

[Frank Drackman]

I get the feeling women have been avoiding you for quite a while.

[hobie]

No. They're just avoiding Texan gynecologists with bounties on their heads

[Poxigah146]

Anyone who claims that is lying.

[bye]

How stupid you are , Hobie.

I am sure women who would be friends with YOU think that way but women in general do not

Study: 96% of women who couldn't access abortion don't regret that after 5 years
https://thelifeinstitute.net/blog/2021/study-96-of-women-who-couldnt-access-abortion-dont-regret-that-after-5-years

THE AMERICAN FEMINIST
https://feministsforlife.org/

And don't forget super-atheist Christopher Hitchens
https://secularprolife.org/2020/04/christopher-hitchens-wound-up-opposing/
Christopher Hitchens Wound Up Opposing Abortion Choice
April 8, 2020/

I can't prove it but you sound like you are masking an anti-religion tantrum under some unrelated topic

[hobie]

No masking here. I'm totally anti-religion. Or as a Nobel laureate once said of religion: humanity's long, slow nightmare

[Joe_dallas]

Hobie - that is to be expected. Delusional people typically have lots of delusional friends. your paranoid texas women friends fit that description.

[hobie]

Some of my Texan women friends are Jewish, which makes your comment - though unintentional - antisemitic terrorism. And don't you dare try to qualify it with distinctions. We don't allow distinctions anymore when it comes to antisemitic terrorism.

[bernard11]

Joe,

Can you not accept that broad anti-abortion laws, strictly enforced, mighty make women reluctant to get pregnant?

Given a cautious doctor and a zealous (or ambitious) RW prosecutor she could find herself in serious trouble, medical or legal.

[Joe_dallas]

Yes I can accept the broad anti abortion laws would make delusional individuals reluctant to get pregnant

[Bob from Ohio]

"Given a cautious doctor and a zealous (or ambitious) RW prosecutor she could find herself in serious trouble, medical or legal."

Scare mongering.

[Armchair]

As many others have pointed out, children are rather critical to the continuation of the human race.

Additionally, categorizing mothers as "brood mares" is extremely disrespectful and insulting. You should apologize.

[Poxigah146]

The fact that the Boomers have made America unaffordable to younger people should be the subject of the study.

[Brett Bellmore]

That's not quite what happened, because this is a global phenomenon affecting basically all societies above subsistence level. There's something about what we regard as modernity that discourages reproduction. Perhaps old age pensions rendering the next generation a commons.

But what is clear is that it's not a linear phenomenon, that once a country goes below a certain level of fertility, it seems to hit a tipping point where fertility keeps dropping. Possibly because the fraction of the population who are having children becomes low enough that the accommodations necessary for child raising cease to be politically supportable.

[Poxigah146]

There might be a critical mass needed (look at the extinction of the Passenger Pigeon, as an example), but the Boomers creating policies that make assets like housing unaffordable doesn't help.

[bye]

NO, Boomers-in-charge did that. The Clintons and their ilk

I tell my college students things along this line. When someone talks about white male overlords, ask yourself "why would you assume they don't act this way with other males ?"

NO, Boomers that were victims too are FAR FAR higher

[William of Brooklyn]

Of course it has to be the choice of the people involved whether to become parents or not. No argument. But population size is emphatically a legitimate interest of the government, whether the issue is decline or out-of-control growth. The Western nations have all, without exception, adopted a social safety net that is entirely dependent on ever-rising population of working age people. Some have quite accurately described this as a Ponzi scheme. But simply naming it, however accurately, won't solve the problem. And declining populations, or steady ones, should not place the entire public fist at risk. Therefore, any real solution has to include current self-financing of benefits and pensions. That means that taxes have to be whatever the math says they have to be, including mandatory savings which should be in individualized accounts. And those accounts should only be able to be drawn down based on actuarial statistics once retirement happens, but they should also be heritable. Those without sufficient lifetime earnings to finance at least a minimum income on retirement would need to be supported through general taxes. The actual solution isn't hard, but the politics of putting it in place certainly is.

[Sarcastr0]

It's not a ponzi scheme unless people are expecting to get out a lot more than they put in.

Look up the many many ways to pretty easily save social security. They are not radical reforms.

This is a right-wing fake crisis.

[Brett Bellmore]

That's normally a requirement of Ponzi schemes, because normally people have a CHOICE about 'investing' in Ponzi schemes. Turns out that, if you can jail people who refuse to 'invest', you can offer an absolutely awful rate of return, and still keep the scheme going.

The defining character of a Ponzi scheme is that it pretends to be an investment vehicle, but instead pays out entirely on the basis of income from new investors. That's SS to a "T".

[Sarcastr0]

So it's not a Ponzi scheme.

social security is not an investment vehicle; everyone knows what it is and how it works.

As I said, there is a menu some small tweaks that you can pick and choose from to make social security solvent for a long time. It's not politically easy, but it is economically easy.

But you can't reason people out of a position they didn't reason there way into in the first place.

[Poxigah146]

You could make an argument that it is an investment vehicle (the investments being treasury bills) but since the money to repay those must come from the working population, you are effectively right.

[Sarcastr0]

I'm all for government easing the burden of having a family with appropriate policies re: leave, and childcare services, well supported benefits for childcare workers, child tax credits, free K-12 education etc.

But the right-wingers here are not about those things. You see regulating the choice *not* to have kids. Or weird incel-esque plans to import single women.

It's like this supposed problem is just another way get to fear and loathing of women controlling their reproduction and lives.

[Martinned]

Tbf, it worked for Romulus...

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

[Martinned]

Makes you wonder why US governments aren't trying to stop people from dying. When I was born US life expectancy was in the middle of the pack among rich countries. By the year 2000 the US was at the bottom of the pack, an the last 5-10 years it's fallen off a proverbial cliff, to the point where US life expectancy is now almost 5 years below Portugal, which is where "the pack" begins.

https://bsky.app/profile/superwuster.bsky.social/post/3lrq3er4rmy2g

[Brett Bellmore]

It's all down to lifestyle differences, and there's not a lot government can do on that front in a still free country.

[Martinned]

Then maybe the government should start by doing a little.

[Brett Bellmore]

Maybe the government should stop getting in the way, instead. I keep track of this stuff, and there are at this point a substantial number of treatments capable of improving health in the elderly, and they're being impeded by absurd regulatory barriers.

[Jmaie]

If the theory is that we need more babies to become workers who can pay for government pension plans, a dropping life expectancy would seem to be beneficial.

[tylertusta]

Unless someone starts firing off nukes, demographic collapse will be humanity's greatest challenge in the 21st century.

Efforts to combat it are only 'dubious' for people who have wrongly insisted that we're on the cusp of a Malthusian collapse, or that we will run out of resources, or the extinctionists that want our species to die out.

[Bunny495]

While I don't have the source at hand there was a biology study using tsetse flies where the female flies did what was best for themselves as opposed to the species. Applied to this situation it is obvious that the best (most intelligent, economically stable, healthy) breeding females are following that; either not reproducing or reproducing in small numbers while the lesser breeding females are reproducing at much higher rates. No question this is an intelligent option for the females but not the best option for the species.

It is all to easy to forget first and foremost humans are animals/living things and for the species to compete with other species it is important for the best of the species to reproduce. On both sides of the political spectrum, we have often seen the comment only humans let the weakest be leaders (this comment has most recently been applied to both Biden and Trump alike).

To quote Bob Dylan in "Idiot Wind":

"Idiot wind, blowing through the buttons of our coats
Blowing through the letters that we wrote
Idiot wind, blowing through the dust upon our shelves
We're idiots, babe
It's a wonder we can even feed ourselves"

[Sarcastr0]

This is eugenics.

Talent, in as much as it makes any sense to reduce it to a single-dimensional metric, remains widely distributed between socioeconomic classes.

https://www.vice.com/en/article/idiocracy-is-elitist-porn/

[myself]

was a biology study using tsetse flies where the female flies did what was best for themselves as opposed to the species.

And the males as well.

Why would anyone with an understanding of evolution expect otherwise?

Applied to this situation it is obvious that the best (most intelligent, economically stable, healthy) breeding females are following that; either not reproducing or reproducing in small numbers while the lesser breeding females are reproducing at much higher rates. No question this is an intelligent option for the females but not the best option for the species.

Ignoring the eugenics overtones, it seems a big problem if you've made reproduction an irrational choice for women.

[myself]

I'm not sure that's a fair criticism. Most women (and men) do want children.

The problem is that societal factors, affected by government's, are making it very hard.

I think one serious issue is credentialing (post-secondary and advanced degrees) was partially generated as a way to enable the male children of wealthy families to continue being successful. But now that advanced education is available to everyone, so if you're looking for a PhD you can't think about reproducing, or possibly even marriage, until you're 30.

The solution in that case isn't to stop educating women, it's to make the process more flexible, and possibly shorter, so men and women have the time and stability time start having children in their mid-twenties and still have advanced degrees.

[Kazinski]

A 550 million fraud and bribery scheme uncovered at USAID, and note these are not allegations, they are guilty pleas:

"Four men, including a government contracting officer for the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) and three owners and presidents of companies, have pleaded guilty for their roles in a decade-long bribery scheme involving at least 14 prime contracts worth over $550 million in U.S. taxpayer dollars."

Roderick Watson, 57, of Woodstock, Maryland, who worked as a USAID contracting officer, pleaded guilty to bribery of a public official;
Walter Barnes, 46, of Potomac, Maryland, who was the owner and president of PM Consulting Group LLC doing business as Vistant (Vistant), a certified small business under the U.S. Small Business Administration (SBA) 8(a) contracting program, pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit bribery of a public official and securities fraud;
Darryl Britt, 64, of Myakka City, Florida, who was the owner and president of Apprio, Inc. (Apprio), a certified small business under the SBA 8(a) contracting program, pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit bribery of a public official; and
Paul Young, 62, of Columbia, Maryland, who was the president of a subcontractor to Vistant and Apprio, pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit bribery of a public official."

https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/usaid-official-and-three-corporate-executives-plead-guilty-decade-long-bribery-scheme

[Commenter_XY]

They all need jail time; years.

[Kazinski]

I'm not too worried that Federal sentences are too lax, Watson the USAiD official faces up to 15 years, I'd expect at least 5 years.

[Brett Bellmore]

5 years seems pretty lax to me. $110M a year, pretty good ratio.

[ObviouslyNotSpam]

Funny how this would have been just fine with Trump, if only they had bribed foreign officials...

[Martinned]

Did you hear about the new Trump approach to the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act?

The Justice Department will resume investigating foreign-bribery cases with a narrowed focus on matters that relate to U.S. strategic interests, including buttressing the ability of American firms to compete for business overseas.

Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche announced the changes after a four-month review triggered by President Trump’s order earlier this year freezing corruption investigations. Trump said at the time that enforcement of a federal antibribery law, the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, puts American firms at a disadvantage to foreign rivals that can engage in conduct forbidden in the U.S. ...

Enforcers should target schemes that hurt the ability of American companies to win business abroad, Blanche’s memo says.

From the memo itself:

In addition to distorting markets and undermining the rule of law, companies that bribe foreign officials to obtain business can put their law-abiding competitors, including U.S. companies, at a serious economic disadvantage. By bribing foreign officials to obtain lucrative contracts and illicit profits — at times hundreds of millions of dollars — corrupt competitors skew markets and disadvantage law-abiding U.S. companies and others for many years.

The Department's FCPA enforcement will seek to vindicate these interests, not by focusing on particular individuals or companies on the basis of their nationality, but by identifying and prioritizing the investigation and prosecution of conduct that most undermines these principles. Therefore, another important factor prosecutors shall consider is whether the alleged misconduct deprived specific and identifiable U.S. entities of fair access to compete and/or resulted in economic injury to specific and identifiable American companies or individuals.

In other words, the Trump DOJ is going to investigate FCPA violations by foreign companies that compete against Trump "donors". Isn't law enforcement great?

[Brett Bellmore]

Where'd you justify the jump from "identifiable US entities" to "Trump donors? I'm not seeing it, unless it's just your default assumption that anything Trump does must be despicable somehow.

This appears to be more of Trump's stated principle that the goal of government is to advance the interests of its own citizenry, not the world at large.

[ObviouslyNotSpam]

If that's not despicable enough on its own, one need only note that Trump's family businesses are directly involved in the type of business activities in foreign lands in which bribery often occurs.

It's only "corruption" when Trump doesn't do it.

[Brett Bellmore]

No, I think his position is that from a US perspective anything US companies do to compete better with foreign companies is fine, if it happens to violate the laws of another country that's the other country's job to police, not our government's.

[Martinned]

If that's his position, he might want to take that up with Congress, in the form of a request to amend the FCPA.

[Brett Bellmore]

Yeah, maybe he should, instead of the usual prosecutorial discretion.

[Martinned]

Huh, I thought we were against that? Or at least I thought we were against it when it involves corrupt decisions not to prosecute people for corruption.

[ObviouslyNotSpam]

Is it any great mystery why Trump would take such an amoral position?

[bye]

So all good folks should abandon those business activities so the corrupt can have full control ??????

This is the core stupidity of liberals. Do nothing that might risk anything even for the sake of the good.

[Martinned]

Where'd you justify the jump from "identifiable US entities" to "Trump donors?

When has Trump ever done anything for a US entity that wasn't a Trump donor?

[bye]

This is Martin unconsciously doing his Deplorables speech.
Or is that you, Hillary

[Poxigah146]

I've never liked the FCPA. It's not the job of the U.S. to punish bad acts occurring outside of its jurisdiction.

If the only way to build a Walmart in a corrupt shithole like Mexico is to bribe local officials, that's on Mexico, not us.

[Brett Bellmore]

And I think that sums up Trump's actual position.

[Sarcastr0]

Bullshit. See the noise he's making about other nation's speech policies.

He's happy to be a busybody to support far right parties in politics. Just not about corruption.

[Poxigah146]

Yep. I even feel that way about the U.S. prosecuting people for sex tourism that occurs overseas. The only way I can argue for it is that someone who goes to Thailand to molest children will start getting those "urges" when in the U.S., and put Americans at risk.

But otherwise, it's not our business.

[ObviouslyNotSpam]

"Do unto others...oh, never mind!"

[Brett Bellmore]

That IS do unto others: "We'll enforce our laws on OUR territory, and you can enforce your laws on YOUR territory."

[Poxigah146]

Yep. And the logical consequence to that is don't come screaming to the U.S. embassy for help if you get caught by Mexico bribing local officials.

[bye]

Proving you don't care at all, just a heartless fixated hater that isn't helping at all

[Stephen Lathrop]

Everyone should study Kazinski's link closely. It is a nice demonstration of how an alleged $550 million bust gets settled out for pocket change in a civil settlement—plus an opportunity for a triumphal Justice Department press release which leads with politics, and buries deflating details.

As usual with Kazinski links, it's written for suckers.

[Commenter_XY]

OTOH, Kazinski is succinct and rather parsimonious in his posting; alas, you are not, lathrop. Verbosity and irrelevance are your calling cards.

[Magister]

That's actually a very succinct post by Stephen Lathrop. Compare to the voluminous flailing by Kazinski over the weekend to try to link the Minnesota shooter, an evangelical Christian and strong supporter of Trump, to Democrats and the left.

[bye]

Buried and dug up too hmmm interesting juxtaposition of images -- and you must be like very high up in government to have this top-secret infor. You must imporant, right

[Kazinski]

Kind of nuts to claim a cut and dried DOJ press release about a half dozen guilty pleas is sketchy.

But you are coming around Lathrop, if even that kind of government press release can't be trusted it seems like you are beginning to understand why we need to cut government so badly.

That isn't where I was going, when I posted it, but you've convinced me, fire the hack who wrote the press release, and the career DOJ employees that prosecuted it. They are all part of this mess too, and I'm glad you pointed it out.

[David Nieporent]

Three points:

1) This was uncovered under Biden, not by Elon Musk's team.
2) A government official was taking bribes to steer contracts, which is of course criminal, but they seem to have been legit contracts. That is, the companies that were awarded the contracts appear to have been performing.
3) This just reflects how small scale the actual fraud out there is. $550 million over ten years — $55 million per year — is less than pocket change for the federal govt. You'd have to find 10,000 such instances for it to make any dent in the deficit.

[Commenter_XY]

Oh, so just look the other way b/c 55MM is chump change? Is that it? ????

It was a half BILLION over a decade.

[David Nieporent]

so just look the other way

No. Are you capable of reading the English language?

It was a half BILLION over a decade.

Which is indeed chump change. During that time period, the federal government spent about 50 TRILLION.

[bye]

David, you are getting very near the universally-loathed attitude Senator Dirksen : “A billion here, a billion there, and pretty soon you're talking real money."
I should remind you that if anything unites folk in hating to the core Kamala Harris it's that taking of money from poor scraping supporters and giving it to a billionaire

According to a New York Post report, VP Kamala Harris’ campaign shelled out around $2.5 million to Oprah Winfrey’s production company for a gala town hall event

[Kazinski]

But it certainly shows the lack of oversight and potential for self dealing at USAid. I did look at the press release, and while I did realize there was a good chance it was uncovered in the Biden Administration, the press release didn't say so I didn't bring it up.

As for Lathrop's carping about the fines, it appears DOJ has a standard formula that calulates the fines, and if the fine would bankrupt the firm and the DOJ can't recover it all anyway, then they look at the books and reduce the fine to an amount that will allow them to stay solvent.

I don't know how Lathrop feels about allowing innocent employees to keep their jobs, but it sounds reasonable to me.

[David Nieporent]

But it certainly shows the lack of oversight and potential for self dealing at USAid.

It does not do anything of the sort.

[Joe_dallas]

That is exactly what it shows
You dont get that level of fraud with proper oversight.

[David Nieporent]

First, as I said, there's no evidence of "fraud" at all. This is not a case where a public official created some bogus accounting entries to give money to his accomplices on fake contracts. This is a case where they bribed him to steer contracts their way. Criminal, of course, and plausible that the govt paid too much as a result. But that doesn't mean the govt didn't get what it was buying. (And also doesn't mean that the "scale" — which, again, is tiny — )

(Hypothetical example: let's suppose the government puts out an RFP for, let's say, vehicle maintenance services. Company A submits a bid with a $5 million price. Company B submits a bid with a $5.1 million price, and offers a $50,000 bribe to the procurement officer. The bribed officer awards the contract to Company B. Company B does what it is contracted to do. Has the government lost money? Yes. But even though this will be booked as a $5.1 million crime, the government only lost $100,000, not $5.1 million, and it got the services.

Second, this may be counterintuitive to unsophisticated people, but the "proper" amount of fraud in a program is not, in fact, zero. At some point efforts to root out fraud pass the point of diminishing returns.

[Joe_dallas]

Kaz 's original statement is correct
Your response to Kaz is flat out wrong
Both yours and Gaslight 's attempts spin away your distortion is lame

[David Nieporent]

Once again, bookkeeper_joe proves too incompetent to do anything other than say "Wrong" or "distorted" or "misleading," without providing any specifics as to what is wrong/distorted/misleading, let alone any evidence in support.

(I understand why he's reluctant to do so, after being utterly humiliated when he made a brief effort to identify an error of Justice Jackson's that he said she had made and was caught lying, claiming that she misrepresented the holding of a case that she never discussed the holding of at all. At least if he sticks to his vague "wrong/distorted/misleading," he can only look ignorant rather than be proven a liar.)

[Joe_dallas]

Again
Kaz statement was correct
Your response was dead wrong
yet you continue to mispresent and distort what you stated, trying to cover up your misstatement.

[David Nieporent]

Still can't provide even one thing I said that was wrong, misrepresented, distorted, or misstated, you pathetic clown who was caught using a sock puppet.

[Armchair]

Fraud on this scale indicates a lack of proper oversight.

[Sarcastr0]

Neato ipse dixit, but DMN baselined the actual scale here.

[Joe_dallas]

As others have noted
3) Fraud is real, and $550 million is a lot of money. Comparing it to the deficit (which Kaz didn't bring up) is a way of misleading the discussion and attempting to disregard it.

[Sarcastr0]

Number big is not a useful metric. You need a baseline to tell if it's big or not.

Of course, you're no fan of the truth and prefer to go with vibes for everything and call it common sense, so maybe YOU don't need it.

Fraud occurs. There will always be some fraud.
That alone does not mean oversight is insufficient. Even if number big without baseline.

[Joe_dallas]

Sarcastr0 19 minutes ago
"That alone does not mean oversight is insufficient. "

I would say that response is stupid even by your standards, but is your normal ignorance of how things work in the real world. Fraud happens in that environment because the lack of oversight.

[Sarcastr0]

If your goal is to eliminate all fraud in any program of size, you would require nigh-infinite resources.

[Stella Link's Ghost]

First thing to do, of course, is to fire all the inspectors general.

[Joe_dallas]

your missing the point (as usual)
D unimportant N claimed the fraud did not show a lack of oversight.

[Sarcastr0]

claimed the fraud did not show a lack of oversight

Nope. He claimed it did not show a lack of *proper* oversight. Which is exactly what I'm saying.

[Joe_dallas]

Sarcastr0 1 hour ago
Flag Comment
Mute User
claimed the fraud did not show a lack of oversight

Nope. He claimed it did not show a lack of *proper* oversight. Which is exactly what I'm saying.

Dude - you cant read
I was the one that said that - D the distorter N did not say that

[Sarcastr0]

...Are you also Armchair?

Anyhow, DMN replied above and noted that the issue here was bribery not fraud.

But the big issue here is you yet again refusing to be taught because it might make have to change your mind from your initial simplistic position.

bye gets it, even.

[Joe_dallas]

Sarcastr0 2 hours ago
"Anyhow, DMN replied above and noted that the issue here was bribery not fraud."

A distinction in this case without a difference.

Fraud” is any activity that relies on deception in order to achieve a gain. Fraud becomes a crime when it is a “knowing misrepresentation of the truth which includes bribery.

[Commenter_XY]

The baseline is zero, dipshit. So the scale is huge.

[bye]

Joe and armchair, you are both defining proper oversight by the fraud result but that does not follow. Things in the real world do not turn out "all fraud" or 'no fraud at all"

[David Nieporent]

Joe and armchair, you are both defining proper oversight by the fraud result but that does not follow. Things in the real world do not turn out "all fraud" or 'no fraud at all"

Wow. Even "bye" is smarter than bookkeeper_joe and can figure this out.

[Brett Bellmore]

I don't know, I think maybe the corporate death penalty, with the innocent employees finding work at some non-criminal company, might be better in the long run. If the fine is guaranteed to be small enough that it lets the company stay solvent, it starts to be viewed as a business expense.

[bernard11]

Depends.

How widespread was participation? If it looks like only one or two employees were involved then let the company continue.

Fire the culprits (obviously) and make them surrender their ownership, which should be distributed to other owners and employees.

A big fine really hits these people more than the offenders.

In general broad corporate fines make me a little uncomfortable.

[Armchair]

3) Fraud is real, and $550 million is a lot of money. Comparing it to the deficit (which Kaz didn't bring up) is a way of misleading the discussion and attempting to disregard it.

It's akin to taking a case about police violence and a wrongful death shooting and saying "Well, millions of people die every year in the united states, this is just one death, it doesn't matter in the big scheme"

[Sarcastr0]

You're still not offering a baseline.

$550 million over a decade is small.
If my googling is correct, USAID in 2024 alone managed $35 billion in grants. Over a decade, you can see that $550 million is small.

Not that you should not work on avoiding fraud, but pretending this makes the case USAID is purely corrupt is nonsense.

I know you're not here for proper policy analysis, but rather to get angry about things you've been told to get angry about, and keeping angry enough you can maintain your ignorance is an important part of that job.

[Joe_dallas]

Waive it away because its small compared to the base line

[Sarcastr0]

"Not that you should not work on avoiding fraud, but pretending this makes the case USAID is purely corrupt is nonsense."

I prebutted that, Joe. It's a stupid accusation, but I figured someone would make it.

[David Nieporent]

For the record, the word is "wave."

[Mr. Bumble]

English can be such a bitch

[Heedless]

You are more right than you know.

If it's one of a few cases of wrongful death, then you punish the officers involved and move on. You don't (for instance) attempt to rewrite the entirety of America's race relations according to social justice principals.

Similarly, if you find one case of bribery and corrupt contract assignment, you publish the officials and companies involved and move on. You don't engage in wailing and rending of garments or use it as justification for a purge of the department.

[Stella Link's Ghost]

"A 550 million fraud and bribery scheme uncovered at USAID, and note these are not allegations, they are guilty pleas. . ."

The fraud and bribery scheme involved $550 million in contracts. It's not easy to tell for certain from the linked report, but it looks like the actual cost to the government was in the millions, not billions. That doesn't change the fact that the perpetrators deserve to be fined and incarcerated to the maximum extent the law provides.

[hobie]

So you don't like schemes to defraud America, eh?

[Sarcastr0]

The usual anecdote generalization that the right uses because actual facts don’t cut it anymore.

This is small in the grand scheme. It was caught. It is not evidence of any large scale issue with USAID. Just Musk decided it was evil and the bullshit machine spun right up.

[Kazinski]

Interesting detail about the Senator Padilla incident. None of the media got the footage of the question and the charge and the takedown.

It was filmed by Padilla staffers. weird they were in exactly the right position and ready to get the video. Then after it was over they provided it to all the media.

https://x.com/DorLinder/status/1933645933062881564?t=GXuun7OU8MMgEpyE3cZ16w&s=19

[Martinned]

Yes, what a sneaky conspiracy, filming DHS doing what they did and then putting the footage on the internet!

[Kazinski]

It was a planned stunt.

And if you are on Padilla's side you should be happy, he certainly is, hes getting his 15 minutes, which he badly needed.

[ObviouslyNotSpam]

Yes, the confrontation was obviously planned. He wanted to ask her damning questions, and obtain her response for the entire country to see.

What was likely not planned was the physical response--which would only have been expected in a different kind of country than the United States. That's changed now.

[Dr. Ed 2]

Bullshyte.

What do you think Padilla's people would have done if, say, some State Governor had rushed him?

When I hosted Ollie North at UM back in 1999 (pre-911), I was told to make sure that no friendlies rushed him for this very reason.

How about the schmuck in Minnesota who dressed up like a cop and killed three state legislators? This stuff happens...

[Martinned]

stuff happens

Really? That's what you're going with when a far right terrorist goes after Democratic politicians?

[Joe_dallas]

That guy is not a far right terrorist.
both democrats and republics were on his hit list.

he was also appointed to a state board by Dayton and by walz.

[Joe_dallas]

Correction/update - His list of targets is comprised mostly of democrats along with abortion clinics,

he also had "no King" cards, etc in his car

No question he is a nut case, with what appears to be political views that cover a wide spectrum.

[ObviouslyNotSpam]

Just curious, but do you actually think the "no kings" signs he allegedly had in his car indicated his support for the No Kings protests?

[David Nieporent]

What do you think Padilla's people would have done if, say, some State Governor had rushed him?

I don't think that if nobody had rushed him, that Padilla's people would go around claiming that someone had rushed him.

[Brett Bellmore]

Right, but that's got nothing to do with what actually happened, which is that Padilla DID rush the podium.

[Sarcastr0]

He didn’t rush anything.

I wonder if you bothered to watch the tape.

[Frank Drackman]

Padilla was the one getting rushed, of the "Bum" variety

[Stephen Lathrop]

Bellmore — There is a tape purportedly showing what happened. It does not show a lunge toward the podium. But Noem says he did rush the podium. That means one of three things:

1. You need to find more tape, or

2. Noem was lying about what happened, or

3. Nobody knows what happened, and you ought to shut up.

[bye]

Ed you have record-breaking naivete
You oppose to what actually happened 3 utterly unrelated things.

[Brett Bellmore]

He wanted to shout in a way that guaranteed that he'd get a takedown, not an answer.

[ObviouslyNotSpam]

He wasn't "shouting". It's on video, Brett.

[Brett Bellmore]

Yes, it's on video, I watched the video. He was shouting, while pushing towards the podium against the resistance of guards.

He's a Senator. If he'd just identified himself, they'd probably have given him a turn to ask a question, despite the fact he showed up uninvited. Instead he decided to shout over the actual speaker while it was HER turn to speak.

If anybody else did that, I'd expect them to get the same treatment, I'm fine with him getting it. I really have no tolerance for self-important people who think they're entitled to act that way.

To be fair, if Noem shows up at one of his press conferences, and does the same, treat her the same. Spoiler: She's not going to.

[Martinned]

If he'd just identified himself, they'd probably have given him a turn to ask a question

Sure, definitely.

[bye]

That is what he didn't want to do. Senators NEVER go directly to another high-up to get an answer. They have a staff that does that. similar to what Justices in SCOTUS has. Clarence doesn't say 'Oh mean pen isn't working I am going downtown to get a new one" No, he asks a clerk.

Senators are way to busy to personally attend Secy of Homeland Security meetings !!! How many Senators did you see there ? How many have you ever seen. Senators want to talk to you they make YOU appear before them on the Senate Floor as has happened to Kristi Noem.

ALL FAKE AS CAN BE

[Stephen Lathrop]

Padilla said afterward that he had identified himself to security, and that he was escorted into the Noem press conference by security.

[Bunny495]

"What was likely not planned was the physical response--which would only have been expected in a different kind of country than the United States. That's changed now."

Been that way for a while. You obviously forgot "Don't tase me bro".

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xzkd_m4ivmc

[Martinned]

It was a planned stunt.

Makes you wonder why Noem fell for it then. If she's so easily exposed as a dumb, incompetent fascist, maybe the obvious answer is that she's a dumb, incompetent fascist.

[Kazinski]

Noem fell for it?

I didn't see her shouting any orders or rushing over to get some kicks in.

It was the normal cabinet level security, perhaps beefed up for being in a riot zone that handled it based on training and protocol. They were effective, but certainly not brutal, and handled the situation efficiently.

[Martinned]

...and yet Noem was exposed as the fascist she is.

[Bob from Ohio]

Her USSS detail did their job as they saw it, she had nothing to do with it. Your Tourette's "fascist " is just dumb.

[Martinned]

Tell that to the lady who is busy "liberating" LA from its democratically elected government.

[Joe_dallas]

Martinned 9 hours ago
Flag Comment

Tell us who is hanging around with the anti-semites

[Joe_dallas]

Padilla was the one exhibiting the facist behavior

[David Nieporent]

"I know you are, but what am I?"

[Joe_dallas]

Its the democrat party with their anti-semistism that are the fascist

[David Nieporent]

1) There is no "democrat party," you illiterate.
2) "Fascists are antisemitic, so therefore antisemites are fascist" is a failure of logic.¹ Antisemites are found across the political spectrum.
3) We're not talking about "the democrat [sic] party"; we're talking about Alex Padilla.
4) You're literally doing the "I know you are but what am I?" again.
​
​
¹ There's a word "illiterate" for people who can't read/write, and a word "innumerate" for people who can't do math. Other than "stupid," I don't think there's a word for people who can't do logic.

[Stephen Lathrop]

For what it might add to the yarns being guessed at below, please note that in at least one interview after the incident, Senator Padilla said he had to identify himself to gain entry into the building before the incident, and that he was escorted by security people when he gained entry to the Noem press conference. Assuming he is not lying about that, all the assertions about justified use of force against Padilla look like they need reconsideration.

[ObviouslyNotSpam]

You find it strange that a Senator's staffers had the foresight to record his confrontation of Kristy Noem during a press conference?

[Dr. Ed 2]

Yes. I have taught people to do this and it's harder than you might think.

[JoeFromtheBronx]

The senator claimed he did not barge into the news conference, as alleged by Noem, but rather he was in the federal building for an approved scheduled briefing with representatives of the Northern Command. He said that meeting was delayed by Noem's news conference in a nearby room, where she was discussing the administration's use of the National Guard to respond to protests over President Donald Trump's immigration crackdown.

https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/padilla-pushes-back-noems-claim-barged-news-conference/story?id=122817212

This is alluded to in the Twitter video linked while saying he didn't explain why he chose to ask a question.

The article notes Padilla said that he "spent a few minutes in the back of the room just listening in until the rhetoric, the political rhetoric got to be too much to take. So, I spoke up."

He did explain his actions. It also isn't clear from the video where his staff got the video. Or what it was. Was it filmed with a phone? These days, whenever something significant happens, people can film things. It is not like you need to worry about taking a special camera to film things.

As to the short C-SPAN video linked, it is of limited value since we don't see what happened before. There is no "lunging" in the video. How Noem subjectively read the situation is unclear & it would not surprise me if her judgment was off. But, she stayed on the podium. Doesn't look like any serious concern of a true threat.

Looks to me that he went closer to the podium (still a distance away) to be able to be heard clearly. The alternative would be to yell from the back. And, once he is led away, there is no compelling need to push him to the floor and handcuff him.

Staged or not, that was excessive, especially since by then he had very well identified himself.

[Brett Bellmore]

"Looks to me that he went closer to the podium (still a distance away) to be able to be heard clearly. The alternative would be to yell from the back."

No, the alternative would be to wait his god damn turn.

[Martinned]

Sure, because Trumpists are well-known for even letting people ask questions who don't work for the MyPillow guy.

[Brett Bellmore]

"I'm entitled to shout over the actual speaker because I hypothesize that I won't be allowed to speak during the question and answer period!"

No, screw that. I have no patience at all with this sort of behavior.

[Sarcastr0]

Hecklers veto this was not.

You are out and out lying and contradicting yourself because of it.

[Brett Bellmore]

It was only not a heckler's veto because he was dragged out. It would absolutely have been a heckler's veto if he'd been left alone.

[Sarcastr0]

You've speculated your way into another counterfactual that you want to believe.

Press conferences can survive an interrupting question without getting shut down.

Plus, of course, we're not talking about him getting removed we're talking about him getting thrown to the ground and handcuffed.
You keep forgetting that.

[Bunny495]

Sarc, why do you seem to love the word "counterfactual" so much? It seems to be your favorite description of Brett.

[Sarcastr0]

It comes up because a lot of people here like to argue based on speculation about stuff that didn't happen.

"It would absolutely have been a heckler's veto if he'd been left alone" is a counterfactual.

[bernard11]

Sarc, why do you seem to love the word "counterfactual" so much? It seems to be your favorite description of Brett.

Brett: It would absolutely have been a heckler's veto if he'd been left alone.

Does that answer your question? Brett not only likes counterfactuals, he believes that his counterfactuals are absolutely (Brett's word choice) true.

[Brett Bellmore]

So the hypothesis is that he'd push his way to the front of the room, shout over Noem, and then somebody says, "Wait your turn!", and chastened, he retreats to the back of the room and silently waits?

He was ALREADY trying to shout over her, I'm just assuming he wasn't going to unaccountably stop;.

[Sarcastr0]

Making up a different counterfactual and insisting the thing that didn't happen has gotta be one of these two paths is still the same bullshit, Brett.

[David Nieporent]

For the record, "heckler's veto" does not mean the same thing as "shouting over a speaker." It refers to the situation in which the govt (or other authority) shuts down a speaker because of fear of a violent reaction from listeners. (When the govt does it, of course, it's generally deemed unconstitutional.)

Also, just to be clear, I am merely explaining why Brett's argument is wrong on its own terms; I am not endorsing his completely unsupported claim that Padilla was shouting over her, which is not what the video shows.

[hobie]

Kinda like Boebert asking the governor of Illinois in a hearing the other day to acknowledge the protests in LA were an insurrection. Which, of course, gave the governor the green light to bring up the 'other' insurrection. Which caused Boebert to sputter.

Honestly, I'll never forgive the American people for overlooking the calculated overthrow of the government because of the price of eggs. It shows how vacuous we are as a society. How irredeemable we really are

[Joe_dallas]

1,000,000x more in damages in LA riots vs the j6

[Magister]

Since the January 6th insurrection caused more than $2.7 million in damages, you would have to believe that Los Angeles riots have caused more than $2.7 trillion in damages.

[Sarcastr0]

Like Portland in 2000 and NYC last year, LA is now a blasted hellscape. Nothing has survived.

[hobie]

Like tiny, microscopic Saint Ashtray Babbitt, we love giving free money to insurrectionists. And wailing on a cop will get a pardon to boot!

[bye]

You are being really trivial and childish I KNOW WHAt HE MEANT and so do you.

[bernard11]

And to think the guy is an accountant.

[ObviouslyNotSpam]

You are fucking joking.

[Joe_dallas]

2.7m is an extremely gross overstatement of the actual cost of damages

[David Nieporent]

Show your work.

[Joe_dallas]

DN - I recognize BS - you whitewash it

[Sarcastr0]

In the end, Joe never shows his work. He just throws out an insult and thinks that doesn't reveal him as a lazy ignoramus.

[David Nieporent]

You couldn't recognize BS in a cow pasture.

[Magister]

the Court asked the government to provide updated numbers regarding the costs incurred as a result of the damage caused by the Capitol Siege. According to the Architect of the Capitol, the Capitol Police, the House Chief Administrative Office, the Secretary of the Senate and the Senate Sargent at Arms, as of March 2022, the costs incurred total $2,734,783.14.

https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.dcd.236275/gov.uscourts.dcd.236275.37.0.pdf

[Joe_dallas]

yes
I see the 2.7m
there were about 6-10 broken windows and damage to a couple of doors.
That aint 2.7m in damages

[Bob from Ohio]

"costs incurred total $2,734,783.14"

Government math.

I do like the 14 cents added to imply they actually calculated it, rather than making it up.

[bye]

Senators DO NOT do this, it is utterly out of character.
There is no reason to dispute a public statement you can read or view later and respond to later. PUre stupid grandstanding

[Brett Bellmore]

You're thinking of a previous generation of Senators. Today's Senators actually are pretty childish.

[Sarcastr0]

This is at odds with your rushed the podium story. Like you are throwing whatever chaff you got and it doesn’t need to agree.

[Joe_dallas]

Yes they did have the foresight - since it was a publicity stunt

[ObviouslyNotSpam]

Well spotted, Joe!

[Joe_dallas]

its obvious

[Sarcastr0]

Doing a publicity stunt makes it totally cool and good for you to be tackled and handcuffed.

[Joe_dallas]

in those circumstances - Absolutely yes

[TwelveInchPianist]

The most complete footage I've found, in terms of the earliest coverage of the incident, is from cspan.

According to Padilla's account, he was in the back of the room when he entered.

But at the beginning of the cspan footage, he is at the front of the room, past the seated media, pushing toward the podium as he is being pushed back by security.

Since Padilla's account of the incident omits how he got from the back of the room to the front, the only account we have is that of Noem, who says that the lunged toward the podium.

This is consistent with the initial cspan footage, which shows Padilla being pushed back as he pushes toward the podium.

If a Senator is going to show up united to a press conference, lunge toward the podium, and not say who he is until he's being removed, he can expect that kind of treatment.

It will be interesting to see if they file charges.

[Commenter_XY]

The Senator deliberately did not wear his Senate pin, which the USSS would have recognized immediately. It was performative theatrics.

In the words of our departed Rev Arthur Kirkland, the portly, porcine Senator was lathering up the libs rubes.

[Martinned]

Because violently shutting down awkward questions would have been OK if he wasn't a senator?

[TwelveInchPianist]

Awkward questions? Probably not.

A loud raucous unscheduled outburst? Maybe.

Lunging at the podium? Definitely.

[ObviouslyNotSpam]

"Lunging", again...

[TwelveInchPianist]

Problem?

[Joe_dallas]

problem with the facts

[Commenter_XY]

Eurotrash, let's set the context properly.

An unknown assailant just barges into a press conference, doesn't identify himself, lunges for a microphone where a Cabinet Officer is speaking. And the USSS is supposed to just sit on their hands and do nothing.

How stupid are you? How did you ever make it to adulthood?

[Martinned]

Yes, I can see why critical questions would make someone seem like an "assailant" in the eyes of someone who thinks all dissent is "rioting" and "treason".

[TwelveInchPianist]

Why do you guys keep ignoring the lunging?

[ObviouslyNotSpam]

The imaginary lunging...

[bye]

always countering with what didn't happen. What an annoying habit 🙂

[bye]

That is what the law demands !!! YES

He never got to the question so you are dishonest there

[David Nieporent]

The Senator deliberately did not wear his Senate pin

This is typical bullshit talking points. First, C_XY has no clue whatsoever what the custom is about "Senate pins." They're worn on Capitol Hill; are they normally worn at random events 3,000 miles away from Capitol Hill? Second, C_XY has no clue whatsoever whether it would have been recognized in this context. Third, C_XY has no clue whatsoever whether Padilla "deliberately" didn't wear it.

[ObviouslyNotSpam]

The footage does not show any "pushing" (not to mention your melodramatic "lunging") towards the podium, either from the back or the side of the room (where the door was). It is, of course, entirely reasonable for someone to seek to ask questions in front of the press cameras, rather than from behind them, especially if the purpose of doing so is to get on camera.

The issue was the Gestapo-like response, and the consequent chilling effect on anyone trying to hold government officials publicly accountable.

The heretofore "normal" response to an obviously theatrical public confrontation during a press conference has been to reply to it like a comedian would to a heckler, or state that there will be adequate time for questions later--not to have your goons make it go away. At the minimum, she should have warned Padilla that he would be removed if he disrupted the event, giving him a chance to be more civil.

Noem didn't appear to give the order to forcibly remove him at that time, but either she gave such an order ahead of time, or her thugs took it upon themselves to respond in that inappropriate way themselves (which is, of course, belied by Noem's statements afterwards).

Enjoy living in a police state of your own making. I'm sure it will be "great".

[TwelveInchPianist]

"It is, of course, entirely reasonable for someone to seek to ask questions in front of the press cameras, rather than from behind them, especially if the purpose of doing so is to get on camera."

Perhaps, but Padilla hasn't made any claim about how he got from the back of the room to the front. The only claim we have is from Noem, who says that he "Lunged".

"The footage does not show any "pushing" (not to mention your melodramatic "lunging")" It absolutely does show pushing, and I never claimed it showed "Lunging".

"not to have your goons make it go away."

What's the evidence that she "had her goons" do anything? From the cspan footage, she was speaking, and the Secret Service perceived a threat and neutralized it. She doesn't appear to be involved in the incident at all.

[Stella Link's Ghost]

Considering that they didn't recognize him as a senator and that he had come closer to the podium than security thought proper and that his behavior was not obviously benign, restraining him and physically removing him (with not unreasonable force) was probably within the range of acceptable.

But, there is no indication on the CSPAN video that he "lunged" or tried to "push" his way through security to get closer to Noem. It shows him resisting the SS efforts to remove him -- he should not have resisted. I doubt that Padilla intended to behave in a way that could appear to be threatening, but it looks like he did.

As for putting him on the ground and using handcuffs to restrain him, it doesn't look good. But, the SS didn't recognize him and any random knob can claim to be a senator or the pope or Napoleon. It seems to me hard to castigate them for being excessively careful.

[Brett Bellmore]

"But, there is no indication on the CSPAN video that he "lunged" or tried to "push" his way through security to get closer to Noem."

Strangely, the cameras were on the designated speaker, not the audience of reporters. I don't know, maybe administration figures need to start wearing badge cams, to document incidents like this.

Padilla brought his own camera crew, how is it that THEY don't have any footage of him going from the back of the room to the front?

[Stella Link's Ghost]

"Strangely, the cameras were on the designated speaker, not the audience of reporters. "

Is that intended irony? That would be ironic.

"Padilla brought his own camera crew, how is it that THEY don't have any footage of him going from the back of the room to the front?"

Why should they? Is it not likely that his camera crew was concentrating on the main act? Do you honestly believe that anybody in the world anticipated how this cluster fuck would evolve? I shouldn't ask that question as the answer is obvious, even if false.

[Brett Bellmore]

Yes, I obviously believe that Padilla expected a hostile response to his provocation, and had his people there to record the response, and to avoid recording the provocation, which is why they didn't start recording, (So far as we know, anyway.) until he got his response.

I'm serious, the administration needs to be more proactive about documenting their events from all angles, to catch stuff like this.

[Stella Link's Ghost]

You sure do believe a lot of stuff without cause or reason.

"I'm serious"

No, you're not.

[Joe_dallas]

its quite logical to assume that a person would expect a hostile reaction to provocative actions.

[ObviouslyNotSpam]

Such as trying to ask a "provocative" question at a press conference?

No, I don't think most American people would expect to be physically assaulted, merely for asking a question "out of turn" at a press conference.

[Joe_dallas]

ObviouslyNotSpam 15 minutes ago
Flag Comment
Mute User
Such as trying to ask a "provocative" question at a press conference?

No, I don't think most American people would expect to be physically assaulted, merely for asking a question "out of turn" at a press conference.

Obv - your description is not what happened.

[David Nieporent]

Padilla brought his own camera crew

Does "camera crew" actually mean "one staffer with an iPhone"?

[JoeFromtheBronx]

Yes. I flagged this. Anyone can film things these days using a cellphone. But, if there was this camera crew, particularly curious why they had to push down and handcuff a middle-aged U.S. senator. Why not just ask them to vouch for him?

[TwelveInchPianist]

"But, there is no indication on the CSPAN video that he "lunged" or tried to "push" his way through security to get closer to Noem."

True, but Noem said he lunged toward the podium.

Based on Padilla's own account, he started in the back of the room. When he is first visible in the cspan footage, he is in the front of the room being pushed back by secret service.

Since Padilla omitted any account of how he got from the front of the room to the back, Noem's "lunge" account is all we have to go on.

[bye]

So a US Senator has no one in his staff who can go and ask this PUBLIC question, absolute bullshit 🙂

[Magister]

Senators get more attention than mere staffers.

[TwelveInchPianist]

"Enjoy living in a police state of your own making. I'm sure it will be 'great'."

Sigh. Even you ignore the lunging, removing disruptors from press conferences is how we do things in a democracy.

It's only a police state if they shoot you in the head after they remove you.

[ObviouslyNotSpam]

So that's where you would draw the line. Good to know...

[TwelveInchPianist]

Why would you draw it at removing disruptive people from press conferences?

[Brett Bellmore]

"According to Padilla's account, he was in the back of the room when he entered."

I don't see how is is even in question, since that's where the door was.

[ObviouslyNotSpam]

Now I know you didn't watch the videos!

There were at least two doors visible in that room, one very much at "the back" and a set of double doors on the side of the room, out of which Padilla was rushed by the government thugs.

Did Padilla enter the room through the back door or through the side doors? It is quite possible that he did the latter, which would make his account somewhat inaccurate, but to be fair, he was probably not surveying the layout of the room at the time.

[Bunny495]

I am shocked (pun intended) everyone has forgotten "Don't tase me bro".

Those who forget history are condemned to go to summer school.

[Stephen Lathrop]

Still no sign that SCOTUS is willing to take judicial notice that the Trump administration is engaged in an anti-Constitutional campaign to dismantle American governance. It is obvious—and will be glaringly obvious in subsequent history—that Trump has pursued a course to: defy legal constraints; to discredit American governance by making it incompetent and contemptible, no matter what harms that inflicts on the public; and to turn American foreign policy into little more than a self-enrichment scam for Trump.

Trump’s openly announced method, described by administration policy makers as, “flood the zone with shit,” can better be understood as catch-me-if-you-can legal defiance, with egregious violations multiplied daily. It is a method of malign government appointments and policy choices, tailored to deliver clownish incompetence, paraded and concatenated as fast as possible. It routinely flouts the law, with a shocking disregard of the impropriety thus nakedly exposed. And that has been its point.

Not only that. It also seeks to suppress political resistance with threats of actual personal violence, and by totalitarian anti-institutional attacks throughout the private sector.

SCOTUS has stood aside while case after case has been decided below to evince that pattern. But without legal action predicated on recognition of Trump’s historically unprecedented wrecking campaign, it will prove impossible for SCOTUS to uphold its Constitutionally assigned role, and its justices’ oaths, to protect American constitutionalism.

Pretense to ruminate over procedural details, with an eye to scrupulosity first, and insight never, will not help now. That response, continued indefinitely, will never get the job done. In future history, ordinary inference will recognize that SCOTUS non-response as a deliberately-chosen path to legal abdication. Cowardice and self-interests among the justices will be supposed as motivations.

SCOTUS must take judicial notice that its own decision in Trump v. United States has been wrong. It cannot stand aside with pretended judicial indifference while this horrible outcome plays out. A SCOTUS decision reckless beyond precedent has induced a frightening metamorphosis. It has awarded the national executive a regal prerogative broad enough to valorize a king gone mad.

[Kazinski]

I thought this was the role of a Sovereign Grand Jury. In any case the Supreme Courrt needs a current case or controversy for them to weigh in.

They've had a few, I haven't been keeping close score but I'm guessing Trumps running at about a 65% win rate at SCOTUS, but of couse no final dispositions yet.

[apedad]

Here's a tracker of Trump's federal court cases (scroll down):

https://news.bloomberglaw.com/litigation/tracking-trump-in-court-the-scope-of-executive-power-tested-1

[ObviouslyNotSpam]

SCOTUS has to consider the likely effect of its actions should the Trump Administration simply ignore them. Shady Vance was prepped and ready to go in 2021:

“I think that what Trump should, like, if I was giving him one piece of advice, [is] fire every single mid-level bureaucrat, every civil servant in the administrative state,” he said in 2021 on a podcast. “Replace them with our people. And when the courts — because you will get taken to court — and when the courts stop you, stand before the country like Andrew Jackson did and say, ‘The chief justice has made his ruling. Now let him enforce it.’” (The quote attributed to Jackson is, as one scholar has noted, “probably apocryphal.”)

[not guilty]

Judicial notice doesn't mean what you seem to think it means. Per Fed.R.Evid. 201(b):

(b) Kinds of Facts That May Be Judicially Noticed. The court may judicially notice a fact that is not subject to reasonable dispute because it:

(1) is generally known within the trial court’s territorial jurisdiction; or

(2) can be accurately and readily determined from sources whose accuracy cannot reasonably be questioned.

The perfidy of the Trump administration can be easily shown by admissible evidence. There is no need to resort to judicial notice as a substitute therefor.

[Stephen Lathrop]

not guilty — You don't think a conclusion of, "perfidy," requires formal recognition before basing judicial outcomes on it?

I defer to you on legal questions. My layman's expectation would be that to assemble that, "admissible evidence," from the courts below, and to assert formally the pattern it evinces, would have an advantage. Do you disagree that it would serve to establish a claim to judicial relevance independent of individual case requirements?

I have a concern about what happens without a cite to that pattern. There will be extreme political resistance to any such decision, no matter how supported. Thus, a legally cognizable basis for a decision which falls outside typical legal experience might at least prove to be a wise belt-and-suspenders precaution to underpin a decision of historical import.

[hobie]

"and to turn American foreign policy into little more than a self-enrichment scam for Trump."

Correction...not 'Trump', rather the Trump Family. The whole clan is running the scheme...gold shoes and bibles and all. I'd find it all amusing except now it is the entire American polity that is being forced to enrich this one family

[bye]

So let me get your stupid point straight : You fault Trump for using a prerogative given him expressly by the Supreme Court.

I will admit it if you won't , that I take advantage of tax breaks that I have never supported and speak against ...why? Because duhhhh I don't want to pay more money than I have to.

YOur question logically faults the SCOTUS but you illogically fault the President.

[Dr. Ed 2]

It is being alleged that Trump told Bibi N not to kill the Ayatollah

Assuming that Trump really did that, it raises lots of interesting questions both about about what I suspect Israel's strategy in the war is (decapitate the theocracy) and US involvement in it.

Israel doesn't have anything to take out the deeply buried Natanz site nor anything capable of carrying it. We do, maybe -- the GBU-57A/B MOP (Massive Ordnance Penetrator) and the B-2 Bomber, which can carry two of these 15 ton bombs.

Should we take this site out?

[Martinned]

Yes, I heard that, and it put me down an interesting rabbit hole about the history of international war rules against assassinating enemy heads of state. To some extent this goes back as far as Grotius, but there doesn't really appear to be a clear unequivocal legal rule against it either at all, or until quite recently, depending on who you ask. (The US has an Executive Order against it, but that's not the same.)

As for what Trump told Israel, there is some evidence to suggest that he told/asked them not to attack at all. After all, Trump was busy negotiating the Deal of the century, the one that would win him the Nobel Prize. But at this point Netanyahu understands that Trump has zero leverage over him, and so he bombed Israel anyway.

[bye]

It's in natural law stated from at least 800 years ago

and it seems Pope Pius XII supported something similar in regard to Hiltler
Aquinas did not rule out tyrannicide, but instead thought it to be a laudable act if the conditions warranted it– “He who kills a tyrant to free his country is praised and rewarded”(Commentary on the Sentences 1,d44,q2,a2).

Pius XII, Co-Conspirator in Tyrannicide
https://firstthings.com/pius-xii-co-conspirator-in-tyrannicide/

[Kazinski]

I can see why he wouldn't,at least now, seeing how the Ayatollah is the supreme religious leader as well as head of state. If you can keep the casualties at just unpopular military and security leadersit might be better.

But perhaps in a week or two, the calculus will change and Isreal will shift to taking out as much of the civil government snd security apparatus as they can, then start dropping small arms in places where they might do some good.

I don't thik anyone thinks the regime is massively popular with the people.

[Commenter_XY]

Absent an Iranian attack on US interests, the US should not involve itself in this fight. America can hold Israel's coat while Israel goes about pummeling Iran into submission.

Khamenei's ticket to the one-way Paradise Train will be punched by Israel. He will die a violent death.

[TwelveInchPianist]

"Should we take this site out?"

Yes.

[hobie]

Taking into consideration American interests over those of another hostile nation state (Israel) smacks of antisemitic terrorism. I think we should deport Trump to El Salvador

[Bored Lawyer]

Israel doesn't have anything to take out the deeply buried Natanz site nor anything capable of carrying it. We do, maybe -- the GBU-57A/B MOP (Massive Ordnance Penetrator) and the B-2 Bomber, which can carry two of these 15 ton bombs.

Maybe the US can just let Israel, umm, borrow the MOP. We can even give that a catchy name -- how about Lend-Lease?

[Bob from Ohio]

Need a plane to drop it though, its too big for the fighters which makeup the IAF.

I wonder how long it would take IAF pilots to qualify for a loaned B-2?

[Dr. Ed 2]

Initial qualification is 6 months, with additional beyond that.

[TwelveInchPianist]

They can borrow a plane. Just have it back by midnight. And if one of our pilots wants to join the IAF, hey, what he does on leave is his own business.

[Bob from Ohio]

A volunteer like the ChiComs in the Korean War.

[Dr. Ed 2]

Am I the only one who found Saturday's "No King" day DISGUSTING?

The problem with a unified opposition is that it further divides the country, and encourages things best not encouraged.

[Martinned]

True. We wouldn't want people disagreeing with the Great Leader, would we? That's Treason! The Volk must stand as one behind the Leader!

[hobie]

Martin, if you were in America, that kinda first amendment talk - or a hearty oped asking for peace - would get you a one-way ticket to El Salvador. Consider yourself lucky

[Martinned]

I wouldn't even make it past border control.

[Stella Link's Ghost]

What, have you a bomb in your shoe?

[Martinned]

I don't think that's why this guy was sent back to Australia last week: https://bsky.app/profile/alistairkitchen.bsky.social/post/3lrjsdecc5c2x

Hi everyone

I was denied entry, detained, and deported from the USA over the last 48 hours because of my reporting on the Columbia student protests

I arrived back in Melbourne hours ago and had my phone handed back to me upon landing

Quantas held onto the phone for the duration of the flight at the request of the Trump administration

15 hour flight + 12 hour detention + 15 hour flight = one of the harder experiences of my life

I had it easy, one woman had been in that detention room 4 days when I arrived, she’s still there

- They were waiting for me when I got off the plane
- They knew (or it felt like they knew) everything about me
- I had cleaned up my online presence expecting ad hoc digital sweeps; I was not prepared for their sophistication
- Sophistication almost certainly facilitated by Palantir

If you are deleting social media ~48 before your flight to the US, *it is already too late.*

- My phone contents were immediately downloaded, on threat of deportation
- In retrospect I should have denied search and accepted immediate deportation; in general I was too compliant, too trusting, too hopeful

They just came out and said it:

“We both know why you’ve been detained…it’s because of what you wrote about the protests at Columbia”

[hobie]

Palantir - Peter Thiel's massive surveillance machine that the administration now contracts to vacuum every single thing that every single American says. I'm surprised/not surprised the anti-gubmint Right hasn't had a fit about it yet. You rubes sure we ain't at 1939 yet?

[Bob from Ohio]

"facilitated by Palantir"

Latest crazy liberal obsession.

[Brett Bellmore]

"- I had cleaned up my online presence expecting ad hoc digital sweeps; I was not prepared for their sophistication"

So, he intended to present a false social media front by the time people began looking at his social media?

[Sarcastr0]

Scrubbing your online presence isn't presenting a false social media front.
People do it all the time. This isn't your Permanent Record.

You make me feel like a libertarian with how often I argue against your speech-hating authoritarianism apologia.

[Brett Bellmore]

Um, yeah, actually scrubbing your online presence IS presenting a false social media front.

[Sarcastr0]

As I said, social media is not your Permanent Record.
Other than lying about who you are IRL, you can take down or put up whatever you want whenever you want for whatever reason.

It's like saying changing my shirt is a lie about what shirt I'm wearing.

[Stella Link's Ghost]

"presenting a false social media front."

A crime slightly less serious than overtime parking.

[Brett Bellmore]

I didn't say it was a terribly serious crime, in fact, I doubt it's a crime at all, under most circumstances. (I could see it being obstruction of justice or spoliation under the right circumstances.)

But it's pretty clear that when you "clean up" your social media presence, your intent is that it look different than if you hadn't done so. Assuming the previous state was authentic, yeah, that's presenting a false social media front.

The guy reasoned that people were going to look at his social media, and changed what was there so people wouldn't draw the conclusions the existing content would dictate.

I mean, I have occasionally had uncomplimentary things to say about Duarte, and I occasionally travel to the Philippines. If I went in and deleted from FB everything I've said about Duarte, before such a trip?

Yeah, that would be presenting a false front.

[David Nieporent]

But it's pretty clear that when you "clean up" your social media presence, your intent is that it look different than if you hadn't done so. Assuming the previous state was authentic, yeah, that's presenting a false social media front.

No. That's as dumb as NG's claim that dyeing one's hair is lying.

(Now, posting things one doesn't actually believe might be described that way. But simply deleting everything is not "false."

[Bob from Ohio]

"I wouldn't even make it past border control."

God I hope not. We have plenty of home-growns like you.

[bye]

There are 330 million Americans , they represent less than 0.5 % of our country, a truly trivial contemptibly small percent.

[Kazinski]

It worked. It foiled King Charles planned coup.

He wouldn't be the first "King" Charles that tried to regain a lost throne.

I think President Trump is as secure in power as he's ever been. And our traditional No Kings Day is still scheduled for July 4th.

[Martinned]

Sure, what other king is there? https://x.com/WhiteHouse/status/1892295984928993698

[Bob from Ohio]

"It worked."

It kept the status quo, no US king on Friday, none on Sunday.

It was the anti tiger rock of protests!

[Commenter_XY]

Peaceful protest of government policies is not a problem.

What did we see? We saw a bunch of uber-lib white Baby Boomers, with their Sbux lattes carrying handmade signs with pithy sayings. A real revolution! The Revolution of the Gentrified Geriatrics. 😉

In Philly, the protest was a joke.

[Kazinski]

My son told me about Eugene Oregons No Kings march today, he brought it up himself, i didn't ask. He's very non political, if there is any issue that might interest him its declassifying all UFO data, which may give yiu an idea of his sensibilities.

But he brought up the age of the people at the march himself, it was pretty striking, at least to him, because Eugene is a college town, the young folks stayed home, it was just their professors that turned out.

He and his friends were bar hopping.

[Commenter_XY]

Any young males at the No Kings Geriatric Revolution were just looking for tail. 😉

[Sarcastr0]

This is cope. About something that you needn’t care about, but do.

Protests big so what.

[Kazinski]

I care about every conversation with my son(s).

And its nothing about cope, I fully realize we've got a 50-50 nation, and there will continue to be big demonstrations opposing Trump, in fact the more effective he is the bigger the demonstrations, and there were big demonstrations against Bush 2 too, and Reagan, and Nixon (I was in a few of those), and Johnson (finally a dem). They are par for the course.

[Sarcastr0]

You claim it's no big deal, and yet here you are putting in work to say the protests were not big, all olds.

[Kazinski]

I didn't say anything about how big it was, (other than "there will continue to be big demonstrations opposing Trump") my son didn't talk about that.

What I thought was interesting is like XY, I saw news reports and X posts about how old the crowd was, and my son who is not political and is not reading the news commentary brought it up on his own, so it must have been striking.

And really its not any work at all, but you do seem to be laboring to find something to nitpick.

[hobie]

I take it you were involved in raising your son and forming his reasoning?

[Kazinski]

Oh definitely, I've got 3 kids, two progressives, and one apolitical.

The only thing they picked up from me is a conservative life style and good money management. Those are important skills though.

[Brett Bellmore]

Heh. My son (16) has been getting pretty political, and in a left wing way. I don't take it too seriously. As John Adams wrote in 1799, “A boy of 15 who is not a democrat is good for nothing, and he is no better who is a democrat at 20.”; I expect him to get over it in time.

[Martinned]

Wait, I thought it was a riot that needs to be shut down urgently by the Marines?

[Frank Drackman]

I have a "No King" day every January

[hobie]

I realize you hillbillies wish Martin Luther was never born. His existence made things complicated, did it not?

[bye]

You don't know your history. ML supported the kings and crushed mercilessly the peasants !!!

"Luther became more hostile towards the peasants, and in May 1525 he wrote Against the Murderous, Thiving Hordes of Peasants, in which he encouraged the nobility to kill the peasants without mercy. "
stupid stupid Hobie strikes again

[hobie]

Well, you hicks have tried every cudgel you can think of: tax and spend liberals; marxists; pedophiles. Now the new flavor is antisemitism. But none of it seems to stick, does it? Is 'Martin Luther King wanted to kill the poor' your next brilliant parry? Amusing

[mulched]

By the 16th century, a split in the Catholic Church was probably inevitable for political reason, as evidenced by the Anglican and Anabaptist splits. Probably Luther's birth isn't the existential event that you describe, but Germany was a particularly fertile ground for an anti-Rome revolt.

[Magister]

I think hobie was actually referencing Martin Luther King, Jr.

[TwelveInchPianist]

"Am I the only one who found Saturday's "No King" day DISGUSTING?"

You'd think that if the left is going to call him a King, the least they could do is have the courtesy to beat him in an election.

[ObviouslyNotSpam]

"He who saves his Country does not violate any Law."

[Brett Bellmore]

The problem is all those people who want to save the country from the actual electorate.

[Martinned]

It sounds like your problem is with the guy who tried to "fix" the 2020 presidential election result.

[hobie]

Ouch!

[ObviouslyNotSpam]

Like Kristy Noem?

“We are not going away,” she warned. “We are staying here to liberate the city from the socialists and the burdensome leadership that this governor and that this mayor have placed on this country and what they have tried to insert into the city.”

[Malika the Maiz]

Call him? He’s referred to himself as a King, and Pope.

[David Nieporent]

Am I the only one who found Saturday's "No King" day DISGUSTING?

Yes. This has been yet another episode of Simple Answers to Stupid Questions.

[Frank Drackman]

I'll give you that much David Notpotent,
your answers are certainly "Simple"

[hobie]

Now be fair, Frankie. Apart from his tribalism, David is a good guy. And I'm a bit surprised that you'd pick on a fellow Jew and risk the rancor of being an antisemitic terrorist

[Jmaie]

This is just silly. Not that he needs defending by me, but David is probably the least tribal person here…

[Malika the Maiz]

Fictional character who can’t write complete sentence lobs “simple” charge.

This is MAGA.

[bye]

It was a great display of puerile hatred, should work some very favorable results for Trump. I always recur to the dishonesty of someone protesting NOW who didn't see Biden preparing this THEN. Of course with millions just coming over you will have a sea of perverts, the violent, and the unstable not to mention terrorists and druggies.

If you said nothing , did nothing under Biden you are provably dishonest.

[Brett Bellmore]

I rather liked Trump's response:

"A HUGE THANK YOU to all the "No Kings" protesters yesterday! I was very concerned a king was trying to take my place, but thanks to your tireless efforts, I am STILL YOUR PRESIDENT! Great job, all!!!"

Ah, appears he didn't really post this, but still funny. Maybe he will, yet.

[Martinned]

Genie: ok what do you want for your birthday

Trump: a military parade, oh, and also millions of people on the street chanting my name

Genie: okie dokie

[Brett Bellmore]

Admittedly, that's funny, too.

[Jerry B.]

https://babylonbee.com/news/trump-is-a-king-say-people-freely-protesting-in-a-free-country

[Martinned]

Tbf, people being shot at by federal agents are also protesting.

[Martinned]

Since the Great Leader's Birthday Parade unironically played CCR's Fortunate Son, but stopped short of playing the (copyrighted) version with lyrics, it might be good to actually share those lyrics. Because there seems to be some confusion.

Some folks are born made to wave the flag
Hoo, they're red, white and blue
And when the band plays "Hail to the chief"
Ooh, they point the cannon at you, Lord

It ain't me, it ain't me
I ain't no senator's son, son
It ain't me, it ain't me
I ain't no furtunate one, no

Some folks are born silver spoon in hand
Lord, don't they help themselves, Lord?
But when the taxman come to the door
Lord, the house lookin' like a rummage sale, yeah

It ain't me, it ain't me
I ain't no millionaire's son, no, no
It ain't me, it ain't me
I ain't no fortunate one, no

Yeah-yeah, some folks inherit star-spangled eyes
Hoo, they send you down to war, Lord
And when you ask 'em, "How much should we give?"
Hoo, they only answer, "More, more, more, more"

It ain't me, it ain't me
I ain't no military son, son, Lord
It ain't me, it ain't me
I ain't no fortunate one, one
It ain't me, it ain't me
I ain't no fortunate one, no, no, no
It ain't me, it ain't me
I ain't no fortunate son, no, no, no
It ain't me, it ain't me...

[Commenter_XY]

Don't give up your day job, eurotrash.

[hobie]

Classy

[bye]

I was there, it's about VIETNAM and that was all Democrats.

[Bob from Ohio]

"share those lyrics"

More proof that no one pays attention to lyrics if they like thesong.

See, for example, Born in the USA

[Malika the Maiz]

Dumb people are dumb, and MAGA is dumb.

But I repeat myself…

[Martinned]

Speaking of the Greatest Military Parade ever, here is a soldier holding up a toy airplane to show off the awesome military might of the United States: https://bsky.app/profile/aphclarkson.bsky.social/post/3lrndowieas2e

[Frank Drackman]

a 62 grain bullet was enough to take out Bin Laden

[Stephen Lathrop]

Also speaking of that parade.

Plenty of loving close-ups in the Fox News coverage of troops passing in review. After a while, I started to wonder if there was some bias in Fox coverage, or was there something worth noting in the troop selection process. Seems like unbiased sources think U.S. Army ethnicity is:

"White, Not Hispanic: 53.6%, Black, Not Hispanic: 20.3%, Hispanic: 17.6%, Asian or Pacific Islander: 6.9%, American Indian or Alaskan Native: 0.9%, and Unknown/Other: 0.8%."

That was not the distribution my unscientific expectation and observation seemed to disclose. It did note more blacks than I expected standing in tank turrets. Otherwise, remarkably white, with exceptions thinly dotted here and there.

I wonder if those are facts someone could check? Take a look and see for yourself. Maybe you will disagree with me.

[Martinned]

It wouldn't be the first time. When the Free French were given the privilege of symbolically liberating Paris in 1944, they also had to scramble to fine a unit without any black people in it to do the deed, so that it would "look good" in the pictures.

[Brett Bellmore]

Maybe blacks for some reason prefer to enlist in the armored divisions? And aren't fond of band practice? You don't normally expect to get a representative sample for a special event, unless you go out of your way.

[bye]

Here is where YOU should start

Survey: Obama gets a thumbs down from the troops

CNN
https://www.cnn.com › 2014/12/22 › politics › obama-...
Dec 22, 2014 — Just 15% of active-duty servicemembers gave Obama a thumbs up in the annual Military Times survey and more than half – 55% – say they disapprove

[hobie]

Since we got rid of all the cripples, niggers, women and dwarfs from air traffic control, you can take that toy airplane and run it right off the runway (like most planes since) and into the ditch where there's a crumpled term paper from Auburn and a discarded Trump Clan LLC contract from the Caymans

[Martinned]

In case anyone is wondering who is "rioting", here's a video of a peaceful protest becoming decidedly less peaceful because the LA Sheriff's Department decides to mount a cavalry charge with flash bang granades and teargas.

https://www.msnbc.com/msnbc/amp-video/mmvo241608261886

[Kazinski]

That of course is up to local officials, The LA Sheriff is an elected office, and definitely has not been federalized.

But they've always been ready to kick some ass at the drop of a hat, even if you don't have one, for which i don't blame them much, LA county is a tough beat.

[Martinned]

It would have been up to local officials, if it wasn't the Trumpist excuse for sending in the military.

Here is a thread by an eyewitness of the Sheriff's office and the LAPD accidentally hitting each other with rubber bullets and teargas: https://bsky.app/profile/chadloder.bsky.social/post/3lrmazo2wbc2v

[Kazinski]

I don't think you understand, the Sheriff's have their own leadership and commanders the President nor the military is in their chain of command

And I wouldn't be entirely sure than non-lethal friendly fire between the sheriffs and PD is accidental.

[Martinned]

I understand that just fine. You're the one claiming there are "riots" in LA.

[Frank Drackman]

Don't mind the smoke and explosions, that's just me "peacefully" setting your car on Fire.

[hobie]

If only they would beat a cop nearly to death then they get some settlement money and a pardon. Alas, the amateurs just vandalized

[bye]

But the illegality is in not dispersing. If you look at mounted police and think " Oh this proves I am acting legally" well dumbness knows no bounds

[hobie]

So you don't like it when people brutalize a public space and won't disperse, eh?

[ObviouslyNotSpam]

How's the MAGA "Vance Boelter is a Democrat", "false flag", "Marxist" case looking now?

The perp was arrested without a shot, and hopefully we will shortly learn more about his deep motivations for allegedly shooting and murdering Democratic politicians and targeting numerous other Democratic politicians and Planned Parenthood operations.

This case has been so confusing to some people...

[Martinned]

It worked when someone tried to assassinate Nancy Pelosi...

[Commenter_XY]

Let's see his manifesto.

[Brett Bellmore]

Looking pretty good, so far. Are you arguing that Walz put a right-wing Republican on that board?

But, yes, if the police ever let go of that manifesto, we may learn something of his motives.

[ObviouslyNotSpam]

Even if the "manifesto" is never released, most of us will be able to figure it out if he's convicted of the charges already filed against him; but some of us will still be convinced it was a "lovers' quarrel".

[Kazinski]

I think in a jurisdiction like Minnesota with Keith Ellison as AG, Tim Walz as governor if he had a right wing political motivation we will know soon, or we would already.

But I think the FBI and DOJ has a hook to get involved too, if they want to, so I don't think there is much chance the manifesto gets buried one way or another, especially if there is a trial.

[Malika the Maiz]

He’s holding out for a false flag, til’ the end of the news cycle,
He needs to be left, or needs to be bi,
See, I’m a partisan hack that must try!

[David Nieporent]

Looking pretty good, so far. Are you arguing that Walz put a right-wing Republican on that board?

Well, if Walz put him on the board, and he's a right-wing Republican, then, yes, Walz put a right-wing Republican on that board. QED.

Again: these aren't partisan things.

[bye]

No, that is what is wrong in your thinking. You deduce 'right wing' from things like abortionists on his list.

SECULAR PRO LIFE SITE (TOTALLY NON-RELIGOUS )
Christopher Hitchens Wound Up Opposing Abortion Choice
April 8, 2020
https://secularprolife.org/2020/04/christopher-hitchens-wound-up-opposing/

You are commiting the fallacy of defining somthing to fit what you have already decided to argue against

[tylertusta]

If only you had an ounce of this kind of restraint when talking about about Federal district court judges' relationships to the President that nominated them.

[David Nieporent]

While a seat on the bench is not a partisan office, judicial nominees are vetted for partisan background.

[tylertusta]

Except for all of those times where a President compromises with the other party to fill a position that was jealously guarded.

[Kazinski]

And it also appears Boelter's wife worked for Walz as an intern in 2010. It hasn't been confirmed that its the same Jennifer Boelter, which is not a common name. But its been out there long enough that you'd expect it to be refuted by now if it wasn't her. (There were claims on social media that another Jennifer Boelter,, who is a medical doctor was Boelter's wife, that was refuted by her employer).

https://www.legistorm.com/person/Jennifer_Boelter/153350.html

And it hasn't also hasn't been completely ruled out Jennifer was involved somehow, although I doubt it. She was stopped Sunday and had a gun, "passports", and cash, but she may have just no been concerned about her own personal safety.

https://www.fox9.com/news/vance-boelters-wife-traffic-stop-onamia

I posted this list of verified facts Saturday, I don't think there is much more we know other than speculation and he's been caught:

"The first victim and only fatality was in the news prominently in the last week as the only Democrat in the house to (reluctantly) vote for a Tim Walz approved budget deal that ended Medicaid for illegal aliens.

Boelter had some affiliation with an African Immigrant group(https://www.mnafricansunited.org/notid/dr.-vance-boelter-e.d.d.)

Boelter was a former member of a state board appointed by 2 different governors.

Boelter's wife was apparently a legislative intern for Congressman Tim Walz, I say apparently because there is no confirmation that its not a different Jennifer Boelter (https://www.legistorm.com/person/bio/153350/Jennifer_Boelter.html)

He had multiple "No Kings" protest signs in his vehicle."

[Kazinski]

Wow 4 links, I didn't think that waa possible.

But one of them, the African Immigrant link is a 404 now, I wonder what would have caused that?

[Brett Bellmore]

The commenting system seems more tolerant of multiple links if you don't bother properly formatting the html, but instead just include naked urls. But I've never managed more than 3.

[Sarcastr0]

Working so hard at this shit.

[LawTalkingGuy]

Even compared to regular right-wing conspiracies this effort has been particularly batshit. Especially if you look at twitter. They’re actually going with: this guy is Tim Walz’s best friend in the cesspool.

[Kazinski]

Well do you have any other verified facts to add? I'm sure there will be more but I haven't seen any.

[Sarcastr0]

Burden isn't on my. I don't have a narrative. I'm fine with waiting.

You're the one putting in the hours to speculate your way into a world pure of non-liberal villains.

[ObviouslyNotSpam]

They appear to fear that if they don't get the lies in early, the facts may actually prevail.

[hobie]

Probably why they want to kill NPR. Facts are like kryptonite to the MAGA, and NPR delivers them

[LawTalkingGuy]

https://www.startribune.com/fact-check-did-vance-boelter-suspect-in-minnesota-shootings-have-close-ties-to-gov-tim-walz/601373519

[Joe_dallas]

fwiw the star tribune has a well known far left reporting bias

a more balanced view :

https://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2025/06/legislators-shot-in-minnesota.php

[Stella Link's Ghost]

Hinderaker offers a balanced view? First time for everything, I guess.

[jb]

In fairness, that particular Powerline posting seems pretty rooted in facts and not opinionated.

I also don't think it meaningfully addresses any of the claims in the Star Tribune piece, which seems to be reasonably well reported. Everything in the Powerline post could be correct and everything in the Star Tribune piece could be correct simultaneously.

At a minimum, the fact that this guy was a Trump supporter and essentially all of his targets were Democrats should probably give you a first impression that he was likely right-leaning trying to assassinate left-leaning politicians and other hypotheses are going to need a reasonably high dose of facts to overcome that.

[LawTalkingGuy]

It was also useful for explaining how state advisory boards actually work in practice.

[bernard11]

Balanced??? Powerline???

I really did laugh at that.

[Joe_dallas]

its considerably more balanced and accurate than the msm

[David Nieporent]

[Citation needed]

[Martinned]

In the category of "everything is securities fraud" (or, in this case, breach of fiduciary duty).

Alphabet Inc.'s leaders may have exposed it to significant legal risk by continuing to distribute TikTok through its Google Play app store, according to a lawsuit filed Tuesday.

An investor sued the tech giant for documents, saying it was unwise to restore TikTok based solely on President Donald Trump’s executive order pledging not to enforce a ban on the Chinese-owned social media app. Google delisted TikTok in January, after the US Supreme Court upheld the federal law banning it, but restored it in February, about three weeks after Trump issued the order on the first day of his second term.

The move appears to put Alphabet at the mercy of a mercurial president, according to the filing in Delaware’s Chancery Court. “The first five months of the current administration’s term is already replete with examples of President Trump changing his mind,” the suit says.

(Of course, Alphabet not putting Tiktok in its app store would have also created legal problems...)

[ObviouslyNotSpam]

Is it unreasonable to recognize that the rule of law has been effectively rescinded?

[Martinned]

It looks like ICE is going to stop their razzias in places where people vote for Trump, and instead do twice as many razzias in places where people vote Democrat. That's fine...

In order to achieve this, we must expand efforts to detain and deport Illegal Aliens in America’s largest Cities, such as Los Angeles, Chicago, and New York, where Millions upon Millions of Illegal Aliens reside. These, and other such Cities, are the core of the Democrat Power Center, where they use Illegal Aliens to expand their Voter Base, cheat in Elections, and grow the Welfare State, robbing good paying Jobs and Benefits from Hardworking American Citizens. These Radical Left Democrats are sick of mind, hate our Country, and actually want to destroy our Inner Cities — And they are doing a good job of it! There is something wrong with them. That is why they believe in Open Borders, Transgender for Everybody, and Men playing in Women’s Sports — And that is why I want ICE, Border Patrol, and our Great and Patriotic Law Enforcement Officers, to FOCUS on our crime ridden and deadly Inner Cities, and those places where Sanctuary Cities play such a big role. You don’t hear about Sanctuary Cities in our Heartland!

[Commenter_XY]

Eurotrash,

This is common sense. Which you do not have.

Where are the illegal aliens? Yes, in cities. Where will ICE get the biggest bang for the buck? Hmmm...You guessed it, cities.

We don't need 3K deportations daily, we need 5K to 10K daily. Homan needs to step up his game.

[David Nieporent]

We don't need any deportations.

[Commenter_XY]

We need millions of deportations, David. Illegal aliens do not belong in this country, period.

[David Nieporent]

Then give them all amnesty and they won't be illegal. Problem solved.

[Don Nico]

Stooopid suggestion

[tylertusta]

Open borders and mass amnesty are non-starters. The best that Democrats could do was allowing them to be scofflaws while making a mockery of our asylum procedures.

And the result of those efforts was Donald Trump winning a second term.

[Bunny495]

"Then give them all amnesty and they won't be illegal. Problem solved."

We did that for the J6 guys, and you were bitching about it.

[David Nieporent]

I distinguish between malum in se and malum prohibitum crimes.

[ObviouslyNotSpam]

Stickler...

[bye]

We need millions.

[hobie]

"Where are the illegal aliens? Yes, in cities."

So why did TACO rescind deportations in valuable rural constituencies?

[bernard11]

Get serious, XY, if that's possible.

They are stopping going after illegal aliens working on farms because the farmers are complaining about the loss of workers.

So you're wrong. There are plenty of immigrants in rural areas. Of course the same people complaining about losing workers were mostly Trump voters.

[Commenter_XY]

I really don't care where they are, so long as we hunt them down, and deport them.

[Brett Bellmore]

So, they're going to concentrate their efforts where illegal aliens are particularly common, and maybe putting less effort into hiding? Sounds about right.

Really terrifies you that they might be gone before the next census, doesn't it?

[Martinned]

No, they're going to concentrate their efforts in places where people dislike Trump, instead of the farms where illegal aliens often work.

[Kazinski]

Well there is less opportunity for crime in the fields, so it make sense in that regard.

[Martinned]

I thought illegal immigration was bad regardless of whether the individuals in question committed any actual crimes?

[Kazinski]

I agree, but there are priorities.

[Martinned]

Yes, and those priorities are to go after Democratic voters not Trump voters.

[hobie]

Stop! Making! Sense!

[mulched]

Finally admits that the illegals are voting for Democrats.

[Stella Link's Ghost]

"Finally admits that the illegals are voting for Democrats."

Since nobody can find a significant number of aliens (legal or not) voting anywhere in the US, it would not be wise to conclude that anybody posting here has good reason to so assert.

[Brett Bellmore]

While few of them are actually voting for Democrats, distorting apportionment has much the same effect of boosting Democratic political power.

[Bob from Ohio]

"they're going to concentrate their efforts in places where people dislike Trump"

Yeah, isn't it great?

[Sarcastr0]

Congrats on once again being a standout horrible person around here.

It's hard to do these days.

[Commenter_XY]

You reap what you sow. Or more aptly put, you can drown in your own shit.

[Bob from Ohio]

"You reap what you sow. "

Those cities flaunted US law by being "sanctuary" cities, so yes indeed.

[bye]

Martin , again your laziness does you in, in front of all REASON readers !!

In President Trump's first 100 days, 75% of ICE arrests were criminal illegal aliens with convictions or pending charges.”

The convictions were for offenses "including, but not limited to, homicide, aggravated sexual abuse, sexual assault of a minor, lewd and lascivious acts with a child, indecent liberties with a minor, drug trafficking, battery, assault, DUI and weapons charges."

I hope you are not past the point where you feel justified SHAME.

[Magister]

Problem was, they weren't getting enough arrests in those first 100 days, and Stephen Miller demanded a much higher daily total, which prompted the protests.

[bernard11]

Oh for Pete's sake, Brett. It's a plain and publicized fact that the decision came because the farmers were complaining about losing workers.

But you have your lies.

[JoeFromtheBronx]

June 14th was also World Blood Donor Day.

https://www.who.int/campaigns/world-blood-donor-day

Every year countries around the world celebrate World Blood Donor Day (WBDD). The event serves to raise awareness of the need for safe blood and blood products and to thank voluntary, unpaid blood donors for their life-saving gifts of blood.

A blood service that gives patients access to safe blood and blood products in sufficient quantity is a key component of an effective health system.

[Brett Bellmore]

And I continue to be pissed off that I am barred from donating blood, (Even cell free plasma!) for life, due to a cancer 15 years ago that would have killed me in under a year if not completely cured. The standards for who they permit to donate, and who they bar, are not scientifically justified, and often political.

[bye]

Okay but for sure if you don't donate there is 0% chance you will donate damaged blood

[Brett Bellmore]

Sure, the blood will instead be supplied by somebody else who has a non-zero chance of having an undetected cancer. The point is, it's actually irrational to bar donations on the basis of a cancer that is absolutely known to be cured.

Meanwhile they're bragging about relaxing the prohibition on male homosexuals donating. We cancer survivors just don't have the same political clout with the Red Cross.

[Stella Link's Ghost]

I have briefly tried to find out why there is a ban on blood donations from certain cancer survivors. Didn't find anything indicating that the blood might be tainted. Seems that there is some fear that blood donation by some cancer survivors may be risky for the donor. There is at least one study that indicates this, but the validity is questionable, so it seems. Other studies find no significant risk to donors. Doesn't seem reasonable to me that the Red Cross enforces a life-long ban.

[Brett Bellmore]

The lifetime ban is directed at 'blood' cancers, leukemia and lymphoma. Because in theory, if a blood recipient was immune suppressed, (Which is fairly common.) and there were any circulating cancer cells in the blood, they could end up with the cancer themselves. A purely theoretical risk, there is apparently no history of this ever happening. If anything, there's positive evidence it doesn't happen.

It still would not be totally irrational if the ban were temporary, like it is for "solid" cancers. What makes it irrational is it being permanent for cancers that are guaranteed to kill you in a very short time if even one cancer cell remains after treatment. Unlike less aggressive cancers, lymphoma patients know with what amounts to absolute certainty that they are cancer free, in a relatively short time.

I think it really just comes down to cancer survivors not having enough political clout to overcome "abundance of caution" thinking.

[JoeFromtheBronx]

See here:

https://www.cancercenter.com/community/blog/2024/04/can-you-donate-blood-if-you-have-cancer

As noted, certain cancer survivors cannot give blood, though "Most cancer survivors can give blood."

Why? One reason cited is "very small chance that cancer cells" can be transmitted, but we safeguard when there is a "very small chance" in many cases. Meanwhile, one website says that under five percent eligible to donate do so.

What is the logical policy here? Risk it out of concern for the right to donate or be extra careful to safeguard the integrity of the blood supply, and try to increase donations among the rest?

Finally, not being an expert, I personally will avoid second-guessing the Red Cross policy. For instance, I did something that led to a delay in my giving blood. It might have been unnecessary, but I understand the concern that even one problem can be trouble.

[Kazinski]

Yes I am fine with non violent demonstrations which almost all of No Kings marches were were, except LA fas usual, and a strange incident in Utah with 2 shot and one fatality, and a scary but thankfully not serious car driving intentionally through the crowd in VA, police said "No injuries were reported to police".

But the Utah incident happened when private event security saw a man with an AR-15 acting suspiciously and engaging him, the man was shot and wounded but a bystander was killed. The perp also had a gas mask.

Way too early to say what Arturo Gambia is motivation may have been, he doesn't seem to fit the typical maga stereotype but it is a diverse coalition. But there is also this:

"Posts on X allege Gamboa is a BLM supporter, citing a possible Facebook profile indicating he attended or supported 2020 Provo protests organized by the Party for Socialism and Liberation (PSL), where another shooting occurred. However, no official police or court records confirm Gamboa’s affiliation with BLM or PSL. Salt Lake City Police Chief Brian Redd stated no motive has been established, and investigations continue."

http://www.hindustantimes.com/world-news/us-news/who-is-arturo-gamboa-salt-lake-city-no-kings-shooting-suspect-identified-arthur-folasa-ah-loo-victim-101750020989578

[Sarcastr0]

Kaz brings up a pretty small story so he can outcome-oriented speculate his way into opining it wasn't MAGA.

[Magister]

At least he's moved on from his Boelter obsession.

[Malika the Maiz]

Give him all the rope he wants.

[Kazinski]

You sound relieved, but I do predict at least one of us is going to bring it up again.

[Magister]

Only an observation.

[ObviouslyNotSpam]

This incident aside, do you expect we'll see more MAGA-inspired violence as the Resistance continues?

[Martinned]

This weekend brought not one but two slow-motion car crashes. Even more slow-motion than Trump's birthday military parade is the FIFA club world championship. What even is this???

Yesterday the number 3 team in New Zealand, a team of semi-pro's who usually play their home games in front of about 1,000 spectators, got crushed 10-0 by Bayern Munich.

For some reason there are two Portuguese teams in the competition, but not Sporting, the club that won the Portuguese title for the last two years. One of the other two, Porto (3rd in Portugal this year), didn't even manage a single goal yesterday/today against Palmeiras, who only managed a fourth place in the Brazilian league this year.

And who wouldn't want to see Ulsan HD, the current number 3 in the South Korean League, play against South Africa's Mamelodi Sundowns?

The Saudis put $1bn on the table, and so a lot of people turned up, but not so many that this tournament is anything other than embarrassing for all involved.

[SRG2]

The Saudis put $1bn on the table,

I wonder how much of that billion ended up in Infantino's capacious pockets.

[Martinned]

Presumably his fee was a % on top of that billion...

[Martinned]

Henry Peacham, 1622:

"the Universitie is not untruly called the Light & Eye of the Land, in regard from hence, as from the Center of the Sunne, the glorious beames of Knowledge disperse themselves over al, without which a Chaos of blindnesse would repossesse us againe".

[Martinned]

Speaking of which: Ancient miasma theory may help explain Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.'s vaccine moves

[Mr. Bumble]

The "nattering nabobs of negativism" seem to be out in full force today.
Belated Happy Father's Day wishes to all of those who raped brood mares to achieve fatherhood.

[bye]

Disgusting you are as bad as that demented 'woman'

[Mr. Bumble]

Re-tune your sarc meter.

[Estragon]

“Belated Happy Father's Day wishes to all of those who raped”

WTF is wrong with you?

[Commenter_XY]

Mr. Bumble is reacting to the very first Monday post.

[Estragon]

1) doesn’t answer my question

2) did you notice what he added?

[Frank Drackman]

I feel left out, I'll be 63 July 4, and I've never written a "Manifesto"

[hobie]

Let your contributions to this blog be your manifesto, Frankie. And what a glorious record it is

[hobie]

Well, I didn't think I'd be in love again, but here we are. A couple of months ago some lady at one of my Airbnb's said she was taking her dog to the pound because she didn't want him anymore. A little border collie. I said, 'Well, you better leave him with me then.' Turns out this doggie is the smartest, most talented, loving dog in history. A far sight from all you suckholes. I must say, I'm in heaven

[Brett Bellmore]

Good for you. A dog you treat well is the closest thing to unconditional love a human will ever enjoy.

When my family moved out to the country, we were still unloading the car when a truck roared up, a dog was thrown out, and it roared away. A Brittany spaniel so starved you could count every rib.

Took a few weeks for her to get over rolling over and pissing herself every time you walked up, but when she did she was the sweetest most loyal dog I ever knew.

[hobie]

+1

[Stella Link's Ghost]

We lost Stella a couple months back and recently adopted another pound puppy. Not sure exactly what she is but appears to be some sort of medium sized hound (probably American English Coonhound) mixed with god knows what -- considering her geographic origin, probably a terrier of some sort.

Stella's name was actually chosen because of Brando's performance in Streetcar. This new puppy is Maybellene, just so she can have her own song. She gets long walks every day and gets to meet a bunch of people and dog walkers and is showing promise of growing up to be a very good dog.

[Brett Bellmore]

That's amazing!

[Magister]

Always a good dog; never a great dog.

[Don Nico]

A good friend told me that her dogs have been far more trustworthy, loyal, and loving than any man she has ever dated.

[ThePublius]

Put your wife and your dog into the trunk of your car. Drive around the block. Open the trunk. Who's happy to see you?

[Commenter_XY]

Better question....Who you you happy to see when you open the trunk, the woman or the dog?

[Stella Link's Ghost]

Oh boy, that's the funniest post of the day for sure. Delightfully absurd.

[Bored Lawyer]

And for those needing a recap:

https://www.instagram.com/livinglchaim/reel/DK59Co9NGgU/

[Bwaaah]

This isn't supposed to be a laughing matter. But that's gold, BL, gold!

[Commenter_XY]

Hilarious...and on point.

[hobie]

Headline from the NYTimes:

"With No Clear Off-Ramp, Israel’s War With Iran May Last Weeks, Not Days

Both countries have little incentive to stop and no obvious route to outright victory. Much depends on President Trump."

It bears repeating: "Much depends on President Trump"

My first thought is: 'God. That's hilarious.' Then I thought: 'Well, whichever side ponies up the most dough will get the pardon.' Finally, I thought: 'You know, which ever side can influence the price of eggs is A-Okay in my book.'

[Commenter_XY]

Israel has defeated Iran. They have air supremacy. Iran lies prostrate before Israel, as Israel destroys Iran's military and nuclear infrastructure, and violently kills their military leadership. Khamenei can see how wrong he was, before his ticket gets punched by the IDF.

Oil and civilian infrastructure is next.

[bye]

But you took the Headline to mean more than it said. It was a purely temporal observation : I may last weeks !!!

And it isn't about victory....Israel has no choice, Iran cannot have nuclear weapons.

Your comment about money is just childishly stupid and heartless

[Martinned]

Flight tracker data suggests the US air force is getting ready to go to war with Iran: https://bsky.app/profile/vcdgf555.bsky.social/post/3lrpwir7qws2b

[tylertusta]

"Suggests" is too much of a word. When the USAF actually deploys, it drags tactical jets with them, and there are no indications that this has been happening.

This could just be to support pre-planned NATO exercises.

https://defence-industry.eu/atlantic-trident-25-finland-to-lead-nato-air-exercise-and-host-rq-4d-phoenix-aircraft/

[Commenter_XY]

It (the movement) enables options wrt to europe and Iran we did not have before. Sounds routine to me.

[SRG2]

"This was the best parade ever, many people told me so with the marching and those large things with the guns that I had asked for and we never had under Sleepy Joe Biden who signed things with an Audubon, and an autopen, and we showed the world that we are America and the United States, except California which has fifty million illegals but the failing New York Times won't talk about that, and I volunteered for the army but they wouldn't take me for the bone spurs even though they said I would have made a great general like Custer who wasn't a general but everyone knows who he was and we're proud of all those soldiers like Robert E Lee and other patriot real Americans who fought against the Russians in the world war"

[hobie]

So hyper-religious nut jobs fire bomb Jews in Colorado, assassinate Jews in DC, and murder politicians in Minnesota. Looks like the Right has some violence issues. Better get them pardons ready, boys.

[Bored Lawyer]

"hyper-religious nut jobs" -- the first two are Free Palestine types. You know, your peeps. But clever deflection.
The third remains to be seen.

[hobie]

Religion - including Muslims who predominantly voted Trump this cycle - is the provenance of the Right. I wasn't aware the Left had hardcore religionists problems. Shooting up places for religious reasons is not one of us Lib's fortes.

[Bwaaah]

It's not so true that "religion is the provenance of the right" as that anti-religionists tend to be concentrated in the left, as you aptly demonstrate.

[Bored Lawyer]

Nice try.
The DC shooter shouted "Free Palestine."
The Boulder fire bomber stated he "wanted to kill Zionists."

Whatever their belief in religions is, these were left-wingers.

Oh and here is some more Free Palestine activities:

Jewish grocery store in Brookline vandalized with ‘Free Palestine’ brick
A Jewish grocery store in Brookline was vandalized early Sunday morning when a brick that said “Free Palestine” was thrown through the business’s window, police said.
https://www.boston.com/news/local-news/2025/06/15/jewish-grocery-store-in-brookline-vandalized-with-free-palestine-brick/

[hobie]

Us Libs are anti-Israeli terrorism. Most American Jews are counted in our ranks. Antisemitism, long the hallmark of the Right is not our thing. Fierce, bizarre promotion of pro-semitism, equality and first amendment absolutism by the Right is always telling. A childish feint you poor bastards keep trying over and over thinking it fools people. Religious hatred or the fear and hatred of others whether they be brown or Jewish or gay is, and has always been, you. Muslim terrorists killing American Jews are part and parcel the vein of Conservatism

[Bwaaah]

Try again, as if you were speaking to an intelligent person, and not just stroking your peeves.

[ObviouslyNotSpam]

There certainly are left wing anti-semites, but there are very few left wing fundamentalist muslims (who are generally anti-semitic)--for what should be quite obvious reasons.

[David Nieporent]

True, but for some inexplicable reason left wing antisemites are willing to support fundamentalist Muslims (e.g., Hamas).

[Bob from Ohio]

"left wing fundamentalist muslims"

Ilhan Omar

[bye]

Hobie , you call them religious which only proves you are not religious. That's all it shows.

[hobie]

I'm proudly not religious. Thanks for noticing. As discriminatory, bigoted and violent as religions are, I'm surprised you'd announce your affiliation

[bye]

Hobie the fool strikes again. No atheist would do such a thing.

Hobie the facts are
A man named Mohammed Sabry Soliman is accused of throwing incendiary devices at a gathering in Boulder supporting Israeli hostages, injuring 12 people. Soliman allegedly stated his desire to "kill all Zionist people" and planned the attack for a year.

ONly a stupid fool such as you have proved yourself to be on here would call such a killler religious. And the depths of your stupidity at least for me is that you never consider he is mainly a murderer and religion is his cover. You are ugly in your mental lazines. Just ugly

[hobie]

Fundamentalism (like that killer) and Conservatism have always gone hand in hand. Open hatred of minorities such as Jews, gays and blacks have been the hallmark - and the eternal shame - of American Conservatism. So that killer, whether a Republican or not, is most definitely Conservative. You boys need to own your rotten history and recognize the killers it inspires

[LawTalkingGuy]

So if you were at a job, and one of your coworker’s friends was murdered, would you get in trouble for a mocking social media post about it the next day? Or at least be a social outcast at said place of employment?

[hobie]

I suppose it depends. If we're talking the Capitol's Police work environment, then beating a coworker with a chunk of concrete, not to mention a snarky media post, is grounds for adulation

[JoeFromtheBronx]

Sounds bad. What about if you posted this to your media account the next day?

“[W]e must expand efforts to detain and deport Illegal Aliens in America’s largest Cities, such as Los Angeles, Chicago, and New York, where Millions upon Millions of Illegal Aliens reside. These, and other such Cities, are the core of the Democrat Power Center, where they use Illegal Aliens to expand their Voter Base, cheat in Elections, and grow the Welfare State, robbing good paying Jobs and Benefits from Hardworking American Citizens. These Radical Left Democrats are sick of mind, hate our Country, and actually want to destroy our Inner Cities—And they are doing a good job of it! There is something wrong with them. That is why they believe in Open Borders, Transgender for Everybody, and Men playing in Women’s Sports—And that is why I want ICE, Border Patrol, and our Great and Patriotic Law Enforcement Officers, to FOCUS on our crime ridden and deadly Inner Cities, and those places where Sanctuary Cities play such a big role. You don’t hear about Sanctuary Cities in our Heartland!”

Calling key Democrats "sick of mind, [who] hate our Country, and actually want to destroy our Inner Cities" might not be the best thing.

Random Twitter rando, I'm sure. (whisper) Oh. Not great.

https://substack.com/inbox/post/166044252

[Bob from Ohio]

"Radical Left Democrats are sick of mind, hate our Country, and actually want to destroy our Inner Cities"

Fact.

[LawTalkingGuy]

Would you say it’s “sick of mind” to spread jokes and conspiracy theories about the murder of a coworker’s friend the day after it happened?

[Bob from Ohio]

"coworker’s friend"

Who is this coworker?

[LawTalkingGuy]

You’re saying whether you would joke about it depends on who the coworker is?

[ObviouslyNotSpam]

I think you know the answer to that question already...

[LawTalkingGuy]

But for your edification: Mike Lee is Amy Klobuchar’s coworker. Her friend was murdered. He joked online about it and posted a picture of the moment before the murder.

[A Japanese Student]

Today at the Supreme Court of Japan, in a case about COVID small business aid. The court affirmed a ruling excluding sex work from coverage, declaring it unconstitutional. Was a 3-1 ruling.

Appellant's first argument was that, by denying from coverage sex work (and only sex work), the law deprived it of equality before the law. This argument was rejected; the different treatment was not unreasonable under deferential standard. The opinion, for some reason, goes to state (as dicta) that sex work is harmful to the employee's dignity - an argument that apparently surprised the appellant.

One concurring opinion by Justice Yasunami; he says the dissent's accusation of denigrating sex workers is meritless. Justice Miyakawa's dissent is that sex work is a legal and legitimate business - and that the concerns about protecting the employees' dignity is misgudied.

[hobie]

Let me get this straight: I can go to Japan and legally have sex with a Japanese lady?

[A Japanese Student]

Standard terms and conditions apply. (Japan's rape law is no longer as lax as they were a decade ago - nonconsensual sex is finally a crime! Well, sort of.)

[hobie]

I'll pass on raping for now. The consensual sex will do.

[A Japanese Student]

One interesting aspect of the adult entertainment law, which both the majority and dissent discussed (and diverged in its purpose), is that sex work is purposefully deregulated.

Nightclubs, pachinko parlors, and other Article 2(1) "amusement businesses" require permits to operate. But sex work - short of (banned) prostitution - does not. They are still subject to many regulations, but they don't need a permit. They can just file a form, claim they comply with the rules, and accept inspections.

Majority says this is because the government doesn't want to give approval to those businesses, thus requiring no permit (which would need to be approved by someone). Dissent instead argues that this is designed to ensure the government doesn't set a standard on sex work.

[SRG2]

Q becomes M except it's C, not M.

https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/czxyx04dv1wo

[Martinned]

Her predecessor but one, Sir Alex Younger, has been on a bit of a speaking tour lately. He's an interesting guy to listen to if you want a better understanding of geopolitics.

[Sarcastr0]

Baseline program management when you catch or don't catch something is:
1) Mitigate as required
2) Is there a policy improvement to prevent or make it less likely to happen again?

One thing that's not generally useful to do is to blame and or retaliate against individuals. People are generally professionals. And if they are not, you will see the pattern vs. an individual screw-up.

Note that I've never had to deal with a blow-up that lead to any headlines. When that happens, I understand the 'don't blame people' can go out the window.

[Don Nico]

You are kind of right, but...
If the problem is significant (cost over runs, significant schedule delays) it is common that there must be a scapegoat. Decent managers remove the person in way manner that minimizes humiliation.
It may not be blame, but it is negative consequences that flow on the person.

[Martinned]

On Wednesday HRH the Crown Princess and HM the King will award a new banner to a regiment that is named after Crown Princess Amalia. Specifically, they will first inspect the troups, then they will receive the three banners of the old regiments that were merged together to form the Princess Amalia Regiment, and then they will award the regiment a new banner.

This is news becase HRH fell off her horse last Tuesday and had to have surgery to put her arm back together. It turns out the surgery won't prevent her from performing her usual royal duties.

The relevance for my American friends is, of course, to show that if your King wants to do more "Head of State things" regarding the armed forces, there is no shortage of things he might do. That's certainly less harmful than whatever he gets up to with his phone on the toilet.

[hobie]

When the crown princess fell off her horse, did she rise up and strain against the pulls of her protectors and mouth 'Fight! Fight! Fight!'? There would have been more dignity in that if she did

[Bob from Ohio]

"less harmful "

It was just a parade. Looked fun.

Tanks, soldiers in period uniforms, flyovers, para drop, chance to handle cool weapons.

[Martinned]

Looked fun.

So fun that Marco Rubio couldn't hide his yawning, and nobody turned up except people whose jobs made it mandatory for them to be there.

[Bob from Ohio]

"Marco Rubio couldn't hide his yawning"

He is Secy of State, US Archivist, USAID administrator. Poor guy has no time to sleep!

"nobody turned up"

Every little boy's dream, if their TDS afflicted parents didn't take them, shame on them.

[Sarcastr0]

It was just a parade

$40 million miserable birthday extravaganza.
No big deal.

[Bob from Ohio]

We had celebrations for the 200th US Army birthday and a parade after the Gulf War. It was just Trump hatred that led your side to keep away and mock it.

[Malika the Maiz]

Please ignore the King tweets and comments about running for a third term.

The party of personal responsibility, folks!

[Sarcastr0]

I found this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Victory_Celebration
"The elaborate parade, which cost $12 million, was criticized by opponents of its militarism."

And this:
"Notably, when the Army turned 200-years-old in 1975, there was also no grand parade given that the country was still grappling with the aftermath of the Vietnam War."
https://www.npr.org/2025/06/12/g-s1-70085/trump-birthday-dc-military-parade-history

But your failed comparisons aside, the thing I was noting is that you were pretending this damp squib of an event was meant to be just a small little thing all along so no big deal it was slapdash and miserable.

Big Bagdad Bob energy.

[Bob from Ohio]

"slapdash and miserable"

Says who? I don't think your opinion means much on this issue, you hated the whole thing because of your rabid TDS beforehand.

[Sarcastr0]

LOL, Bob your saying 'it was just a parade' is as much as an admission it didn't go over as planned.

There's a new trend in saying 'you wouldn't be against this if Trump wasn't involved!'

Nonsense. This would suck no matter what. Military extravagance to the point of breaking the streets is bad.

[Bob from Ohio]

"as much as an admission it didn't go over as planned"

The plan was to have a parade, a parade occurred.

DC and neighboring areas of VA. and Md. is full of Democrats. Their loss if they can't put their hatred down to celebrate our army and go to the parade.

You should have went, you might have had fun. Parades are fun.

[bye]

Poor dumb uninformed Martin. A Democrat did used to do that.

==========================
Lyndon B. Johnson led the nation in an untraditional manner at times, going so far as to conduct meetings with his advisers while seated on the toilet. The 36th U.S. president was known for a method of persuasion called the “Johnson treatment,” in which he won political victories either through flattery or bullying. One of LBJ’s most common tactics was inviting people into the bathroom and continuing the conversation, often leaving the door wide open and creating an awkward environment. While some advisers would turn away in order to give the president privacy, Johnson would invite them to come closer so he could hear them better. One such instance saw national security adviser McGeorge Bundy nearly stumble and fall onto LBJ’s lap while he was seated on the toilet. Johnson treated other private facilities as meeting rooms as well — he was known to have aides stand just outside the shower, and he kept the conversation going while drying himself off afterward. Johnson even had telephones installed throughout various White House bathroom
================================

Poor dumb uninformed Martin. A Democrat did used to do that.

[apedad]

Wow, I agree with Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene.

Greene hits those ‘slobbering’ for US involvement in Israel-Iran conflict

Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) on Sunday criticized “fake” supporters of President Trump’s “Make America Great Again” (MAGA) movement who want to see U.S. involvement in Israel’s war with Iran.

“Everyone is finding out who are real America First/MAGA and who were fake and just said it (because) it was popular,” Greene wrote in a 355-word post on the social media platform X. “Unfortunately the list of fakes are becoming quite long and exposed themselves quickly.”

“Anyone slobbering for the U.S. to become fully involved in the Israel/Iran war is not America First/MAGA,” she added.

https://thehill.com/homenews/house/5352220-marjorie-taylor-greene-criticizes-maga-supporters/

(Uh oh...Bob from Ohio is NOT going to like this.)

[Bob from Ohio]

You can stand with her if you want.

[Malika the Maiz]

Do you stand against her?

[bye]

AQAP Leader Sa'ad Al-Awlaki Calls For Assassinations, Jihad Attacks On U.S. Officials – Including Trump, Vance, Rubio, Hegseth And Their Families - Elon Musk And His Companies, U.S. Military, Microsoft, And Targeting Jews In America And Europe: 'There Are No Red Lines'

Now in Catholic moral theory as I understand it, and in Jus Gentium if this guy were assassinated that would be moral

Denver Journal of International Law & Policy
Volume 31
Number 2 Winter
Article 3
January 2002
The Newly Expanded American Doctrine of Preemption: Can It
Inclue Assassination
Louis Rene Beres

concludes " but it does imply that assassination as a form of anticipatory self-defense may sometimes offer the best
available remedy to aggression and terrorism in world law

[hobie]

Can't Green just contract Soros to train his Jewish Space Laser on Iran? I'm actually surprised she's not saying that very pro-semitic thing.

[Don Nico]

Greene is just stoooooopid. If you agree with her, don't brag about it.

I do agree that absent an attack on US assets or on the KSA, Oman, UAE, we should not participate in offensive actions. If Iran is stupid enough to attack our assets, then they get what they ask for.

[glennalesko]

I've been using https://lacapitalrecursos.com/la-calculadora-de-alicia/ for quick budgeting and time tracking—it’s surprisingly efficient and easy to use. Highly recommend checking it out if you deal with numbers often.

[JoeFromtheBronx]

Excessive use of force, including handcuffing people, should be avoided. The Senator Padilla incident is the latest. Earlier, we had one at a House member's office, including a staffer:

https://gothamist.com/news/homeland-security-cops-handcuff-one-of-rep-nadlers-aides-in-chaotic-day-at-ny-fed-building

The whole thing warrants investigation. Again, excessive use of force overall is a bad thing. Selectively, people here are agreeable to that sentiment, depending on who is involved.

Padilla was in the building for a pre-scheduled matter. He explained he was escorted to the Noem event.

People reference staffers filming things. Now, as I said, that can simply be using a cellphone. It doesn't have to be some big, planned thing. Something arises, people film it.

But point is there staffers there. People could vouch for him. He could have shown id. If the person who escorted him to the room was still around, they could have. He was already checked into the building. It wasn't like he wandered into a street event.

There was no need to push him down and handcuff him. They could have simply escorted him away. Asked for id, after he verbally identified himself, and nothing would have come from this.

The excessive use of force regularly leads to problems that are self-inflicted. This is not the first time a member of Congress and/or their staff has been targeted. Including by arrest.

Security theater is loved by this Administration including bringing in the military to address matters easily handled by locals or normal civilian federal personnel. The infringement of the rights of another branch of government adds another layer of problems.

[bye]

Padilla knew exactly what would happen and why and that is what he wanted. Walk into one of his press conferences like thatand see what happens !!!!

[JoeFromtheBronx]

I'm not a government official who was already authorized to be in the area. People can watch his press conferences. They can ask questions. They should not be handcuffed and otherwise wrongly treated if they do.

This isn't just about him. Conservative members of Congress will ask questions. Conservative activists will. They shouldn't be handcuffed etc., either. It doesn't matter if they "want it." It's a general principle.

[Bunny495]

Don't tase me bro.

[LawTalkingGuy]

TBF, they shouldn’t have tazed that guy.

[David Nieporent]

People reference staffers filming things. Now, as I said, that can simply be using a cellphone. It doesn't have to be some big, planned thing. Something arises, people film it.

Actually, I think the truth (as a general statement, not specifically this event) is a mix of both. It was almost certainly just a staffer with a cell phone, but politicians do have staffers follow them around and video them when they interact with the public, as a matter of routine. That both protects them from false accusations and allows them to create immediate campaign ads if they like how the interactions went.

[JoeFromtheBronx]

That's fine. I'm also specifically talking about a specific situation, which was not just interacting with the public. More security was involved, and a camera crew would be less likely. Not knowing for sure, I was careful to hedge my bets ("can").

[Estragon]

“The White House appointed [22 year-old] Fugate, a former Trump campaign worker who interned at the hard-right Heritage Foundation, to a Homeland Security role that was expanded to include the Center for Prevention Programs and Partnerships. Known as CP3, the office has led nationwide efforts to prevent hate-fueled attacks, school shootings and other forms of targeted violence.”

https://www.propublica.org/article/trump-dhs-thomas-fugate-cp3-terrorism-prevention

[SRG2]

But that's fine because someone somewhere who was qualified turned out to be incompetent. I wonder whether any cultists have enough unrotted brain to criticise this appointment

[Brett Bellmore]

I'm just wondering how much of a New Yorker view of our political spectrum somebody needs to have, to think the Heritage Foundation is hard right.

[David Nieporent]

The Heritage Foundation is hard right. It has always been on the more conservative edge, but it used to be the edge of the establishment. Now it's just full MAGA.

[Brett Bellmore]

All you did there was self-identify as a left-winger. Heritage is pretty middle of the road as right-wing goes.

[David Nieporent]

All you did there was self-identify as MAGA. As I said, Heritage used to be reasonably mainstream conservative. Pre-Trump. Post-Trump, it's hard MAGA. (Though to be fair, it actually started its veer when it decided to make Jim DeMint its president, which was pre-Trump.)

[jb]

Does it make you feel better about a 22 year old with no experience running any kind of organization being put in charge of our country's terrorism prevention if he interned at a center-right organization instead of a hard-right one?

I might even go so far as to say he'd be a spectacularly bad choice even if he had interned at Brookings or the ACLU, although I'm sure that would make some MAGA folks change their opinion.

[Bob from Ohio]

"in charge of our country's terrorism prevention"

Rest easy, he is not. The center mainly issues grants.

Here is DHS on one of its main programs:

"The TVTP Grant Program provides financial assistance to develop sustainable, multidisciplinary prevention capabilities in local communities, pilot innovative prevention approaches, and identify prevention best practices that can be replicated in communities across the country. TVTP Grantees leverage an approach informed by public health research, by bringing together mental health providers, educators, faith leaders, public health and safety officials, social services, nonprofits, and others in communities across the country to help people who are on a pathway to violence before harm occurs."

No terrorism prevented, I'd say.

[Bob from Ohio]

"raising alarm among counterterrorism researchers and nonprofit groups funded by CP3"

Ah, the real reason for the criticism.

[ReaderY]

Prior to Chadha, Congress passed numerous laws that delegated extensive authority to the President and administrative agencies, with a legislative veto serving as a check on that authority. If Congress didn’t like something the President or an agency did, a single house could pass a resolution disavowing it and it would be void.

After Chadha found this procedure unconstitutional, Congress passed an omnibus bill replacing all provisions for single-house disapproval resolutions with joint resolutions to be signed or billed by the President. This means Congress has no check on Presidential or administrative interpretations of or actions under existing statutes other than passing a new statute.

Congress needs a new, constitutionally acceptable default standard way to meaningfully check the President’s and the administration’s authority without having to pass a new statute to do so.

One way to accomplish this would be to replace all current “legislative veto” provisions with ones that call for Presidential and administrative actions either to not go into effect at all, or to automatically expire after a limited period of time, unless Congress passes a joint resolution affirming them. By non-approval the default and requiring affirmative Congressional action to approve, Congress can restore meaningful oversight. This would also replace the current Congressional Review Act.

Every quarter (or other appropriate period), Congress could pass an omnibus bill with boilerplate language affirming everything published in the Federal register as of a certain prior date. While the affirmation bill itself would be fast-tracked, Congress could specify rules whereby some number of members of Congress in each house could sign a petitition taking a specific regulation or proclamation off the fast-track bill and putting it on a slow track for standard Congressional action.

This approach would enable Congress, if it wanted to, to exactly duplicate the effect of the pre-Chadha legislative veto, by taking Administrative actions out of the fast-track boilerplate affirmation bill and putting them on slow track regular order, if a majority of members of either house signs a petition to do so.

Congress could decide to put regulations on slow track with a smaller number of members of Congress petitioning. However, Congress should set the number of petitioners required sufficently high to prevent a small group of disgruntled members from blocking the administration from functioning and Congress from doing normal business by slow-tracking everything. The vast majority of regulations should make the fast track, and only occassional regulations should get slow-tracked.

[hobie]

I noted that one of the signature achievements of the slain women legislator in Minnesota was her universal free school lunch program. I suppose that wouldn't be much of a thing to notice except that when you add that to decimation of SNAP and also federal aid to America's food banks, I'm wondering if a war on the hungry is the next Conservative abomination akin to their war on gay people or veterans

[tuphat]

Re: federal vs. state criminal prosecutions for multiple violations of multiple statutes during a short period of time -- Can someone direct me to a good primer on this subject? (serious question, thanks)

[JoeFromtheBronx]

About one comment, among my "if it were possible" changes to the Constitution would be an amendment clarifying what is allowable regarding agencies. I think New Deal era developments overall were legitimate, but amendments sometimes clarify and fully normalize things where there is some debate, as seen by the income tax.

[Sarcastr0]

"Until the recent changes, VA hospitals’ bylaws said that medical staff could not discriminate against patients “on the basis of race, age, color, sex, religion, national origin, politics, marital status or disability in any employment matter”. Now, several of those items – including “national origin,” “politics” and “marital status” – have been removed from that list."
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/jun/16/va-doctors-refuse-treat-patients

[Magnus Pilatus, MBA, MD, JD, PhDx2]

Cry me a river covid vax fascist. There are Sarcastr0s all over even today killing children by denying them life saving treatments or transplants if they are pure blood.

[hobie]

Wounded servicemen are the suckers and losers Trump despises. He even desecrated Arlington Cemetery (the ultimate losers) during the campaign. So no one should be surprised that Conservatism's war on veterans would target the VA hospitals

[LawTalkingGuy]

So I guess they’re charging Boetler federally. Which raises the question: is Bondi going to seek the death penalty? For consistency sake she would have to after announcing it for Luigi, since his capital spec is pretty weak. Boetler would have several more serious and justifiable capital specifications considering the course of conduct. If she doesn’t, then, well, I think we’ll know why.

[hobie]

Targeting lawmakers has typically resulted in pardons and cash payouts lately. I guess we'll have to wait and see