Open Thread

What’s on your mind?

Comments

[Kazinski]

Congratulations.

[Sam Bankman-Fried]

People that believe Dred Scott was wrongly decided are morons! Watch 12 Years a Slave and get back to me about the rights of the very small number of free blacks in a country of 4 million slaves! America was a white supremacist nation at inception…slavery was a euphemism for what he had in America.

[not guilty]

Scott v. Sandford, 60 U.S. (19 How.) 393 (1856), is "originalism" run wild:

The question is simply this: can a negro whose ancestors were imported into this country and sold as slaves become a member of the political community formed and brought into existence by the Constitution of the United States, and as such become entitled to all the rights, and privileges, and immunities, guarantied by that instrument to the citizen, one of which rights is the privilege of suing in a court of the United States in the cases specified in the Constitution?

It will be observed that the plea applies to that class of persons only whose ancestors were negroes of the African race, and imported into this country and sold and held as slaves. The only matter in issue before the court, therefore, is, whether the descendants of such slaves, when they shall be emancipated, or who are born of parents who had become free before their birth, are citizens of a State in the sense in which the word "citizen" is used in the Constitution of the United States. And this being the only matter in dispute on the pleadings, the court must be understood as speaking in this opinion of that class only, that is, of those persons who are the descendants of Africans who were imported into this country and sold as slaves.

60 U.S. at 403 (1856).

We proceed to examine the case as presented by the pleadings.

The words "people of the United States" and "citizens" are synonymous terms, and mean the same thing. They both describe the political body who, according to our republican institutions, form the sovereignty and who hold the power and conduct the Government through their representatives. They are what we familiarly call the "sovereign people," and every citizen is one of this people, and a constituent member of this sovereignty. The question before us is whether the class of persons described in the plea in abatement compose a portion of this people, and are constituent members of this sovereignty? We think they are not, and that they are not included, and were not intended to be included, under the word "citizens" in the Constitution, and can therefore claim none of the rights and privileges which that instrument provides for and secures to citizens of the United States. On the contrary, they were at that time considered as a subordinate and inferior class of beings who had been subjugated by the dominant race, and, whether emancipated or not, yet remained subject to their authority, and had no rights or privileges but such as those who held the power and the Government might choose to grant them.

It is not the province of the court to decide upon the justice or injustice, the policy or impolicy, of these laws. The decision of that question belonged to the political or lawmaking power, to those who formed the sovereignty and framed the Constitution. The duty of the court is to interpret the instrument they have framed with the best lights we can obtain on the subject, and to administer it as we find it, according to its true intent and meaning when it was adopted.

Id., at 604-605.

Scratch an "originalist"; find a stone cold racist.

[Sam Bankman-Fried]

America was a country with 4 million slaves…that seems pretty racist to me! Btw, most of the major Jacksonians left the Democratic Party in the 1850s and some even helped found the Republican Party! Taney didn’t join the secessionists and his state, Maryland, remained in the Union. Most of the legal scholars that are critical of Taney and Dred Scott are just deflecting from the fact America was very flawed and the Constitution and not Taney was the problem. Dred Scott was not only correctly decided but it was inconsequential in the grand scheme of things.

[not guilty]

"Dred Scott was not only correctly decided but it was inconsequential in the grand scheme of things."

Is that as true as everything else you have said?

[Sam Bankman-Fried]

4 million slaves before…and 4 million after.

[not guilty]

My comment yesterday did not generate the feedback that I had anticipated, so I will repost it here:

The New York Times is reporting:

Far-right influencers have been hinting in recent weeks that they have finally found a venue — Miami — and a federal prosecutor — Jason A. Reding Quiñones — to pursue long-promised charges of a “grand conspiracy” against President Trump’s adversaries.

Their theory of the case, still unsupported by the evidence: A cabal of Democrats and “deep-state” operatives, possibly led by former President Barack Obama, has worked to destroy Mr. Trump in a yearslong plot spanning the inquiry into his 2016 campaign to the charges he faced after leaving office.

But that narrative, which has been promoted in general terms by Mr. Trump and taken root online, has emerged in a nascent but widening federal investigation.

https://www.nytimes.com/2025/11/09/us/politics/trump-conspiracy-probe-subpoenas.html The story reports that subpoenas calling for production of documents in Miami by November 20 have issued.

I am puzzled as to what federal crimes are being investigated, as well as what act(s) if any, occurred in the Southern District of Florida..

If and to the extent that prosecutors are relying on some kind of criminal conspiracy theory, several questions come to mind:

Who are the supposed conspirators?

When was the conspiratorial agreement formed, and by whom?

What was the object of the conspiracy?

When was the conspiratorial objective achieved or, in the alternative, abandoned?

If the conspiracy is punishable according to 18 U.S.C. § 371, what overt acts were committed in furtherance thereof?

If the conspiracy is punishable according to 18 U.S.C. § 241, whose federal rights were supposedly violated or intended to be violated? What specific federal constitutional or statutory rights were violated or intended to be violated? What then existing authorit(ies) gave fair warning that such rights were "clearly established" for purposes of United States v. Lanier, 520 U.S. 259 (1997)?

What overt act(s) in furtherance of the conspiracy, if any, occurred in the Southern District of Florida?

What overt act(s) in furtherance of the conspiracy, if any, occurred within the past five years?

Get out those track shoes, MAGAts.

It could be, of course, that the lack of response from the MAGA cult commenters here is because they were genuinely dumbfounded. I doubt that, since they are generally a voluble bunch, albeit not a very perspicacious one. So how about it, Trump fans? What is the factual and legal basis of the fanciful "grand conspiracy" that Mr. Reding Quiñones is reportedly investigating?

[Sam Bankman-Fried]

A grand conspiracy existed but it was more a “great minds think alike” than a bunch of men in a smoky room coming up with a plan. Bush Republicans attempted to remove Trump and install Pence and they had the same idea with Clinton/Gore to install Gingrich and the GOPe successfully installed Ford as president by removing Nixon and Agnew and stole the presidency from Gore to install Bush as president.

We also know Rod Rosenstein mentioned the 25th Amendment and that Yates testified Comey started acting bizarrely once Trump was inaugurated. And we know Flynn was undermined and McMaster was able to manipulate Trump into continuing the Afghanistan War when Flynn was critical of the Afghanistan War. Oh, and Republicans in Congress voted Lizard Cheney into House leadership in January 2021 and then Haley and Mace were all over cable news trying to get Trump banned from running again! DeSantis was the preferred candidate of the GOPe and he’s obviously a Bush Republican.

[not guilty]

^Poe's Law?^

[Kazinski]

Its OK, I never could figure out what crime Trump was being charged for in Manhattan either. But now a year later two appeals courts are looking at it so I suppose that case, and this one too will all work out in the end.

[not guilty]

Whataboutism is one pernicious addiction.

[Martinned]

I never could figure out what crime Trump was being charged for in Manhattan either

Yes, we noticed. That didn't stop you from loudly proclaiming his innocence, though.

[Kazinski]

I'm glad there are still some places in Europe where there is free speech.

Eva Vlaardingerbroek speaking at Hungarian CPAC:

https://x.com/EvaVlaar/status/1987942751103754569?s=20

On the other hand, there are some places where you can go to jail for just being rude:

"Former footballer Joey Barton is 'an undiluted, unapologetic bully' and not 'the free speech crusader he paints himself to be,' a jury was told today.

Far from being a 'martyr' sacrificed 'on the altar of political correctness', the ex-Manchester City and Newcastle midfielder 'simply descended into behaviour that was worthy only of the gutter', according to prosecutors.

Barton, 43, is on trial accused of 12 counts of posting 'grossly offensive' tweets about women football commentators Lucy Ward and Eni Aluko and also broadcaster Jeremy Vine."

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/football/article-15269273/Joey-Barton-branded-undiluted-unapologetic-bully-not-free-speech-crusade.html

[Martinned]

Yes, Hungary, that famous beacon of free speech. Maybe you should stick to talking about US politics. When you do that, you're also wrong, but at least you're wrong based on personal familiarity with the matter.

[AmosArch]

Breaking News... AP has discovered that the poor innocent drug traffickers targeted by Trump were

*DRUM ROLL*

indeed drug traffickers to the utter shock of no one with a brain. But....they beez good boys. They didn't do nuthin'. They were turning their lives around!

https://apnews.com/article/trump-venezuela-boat-strikes-drugs-cocaine-trafficking-95b54a3a5efec74f12f82396a79617ea

[not guilty]

AmosArch, did you, uh, read the AP article before commenting on it? The thrust and premise of the article is that the decedents were not the "narco traffickers" that President Trump falsely labeled as "enemy combatants," with whom the U.S. is now in an “armed conflict”.

We have come three quarters of full circle with our presidents. George Washington could not tell a lie. Bill Clinton could not tell the truth. Donald Trump cannot tell the difference.

[AmosArch]

Did you read the article? They literally were running drugs but it was okay because they had backstories with fuzzy warm memories supposedly.

[Martinned]

So what if they were? Why would that make it OK to murder them?

[AmosArch]

If you break into a home with ill intent you do so at your own peril. Doesn't matter if you just wanted to steal some money rather than kill the owner. Doesn't matter if you have 3 kids and a cute dog named fluffy. I don't see anyone here shedding a tear for home robbers who FAFO.

If you try to break into the US with ill intent to try to poison our kids and our communities for profit you do so at your own peril. It doesn't matter if the deaths and havoc you are causing are just incidental, and you are such a piece of scum you simply don't give a shit instead of outright intending it. It doesn't matter if you have 3 kids and a dog named fluffy. And then on top of that they're stupid enough to continue to do this with all the recent headlines in mind on top of knowing full well the risks.

Sorry you value the lives of your fellow countrymen and children so little and are willing to sacrifice them for the sake of drug traffickers whose lives you value so much more, even more than they themselves do apparently as they knowingly continue marching off on suicide missions.

[Martinned]

If you break into a home with ill intent you do so at your own peril.

Not if the home owner lies in wait and murders you you don't.

Doesn't matter if you just wanted to steal some money rather than kill the owner.

Not for you maybe.

If you try to break into the US with ill intent to try to poison our kids and our communities for profit you do so at your own peril.

1. No. Just no.
2. That has nothing to do with murdering people thousands of miles away from the US border.

Sorry you value the lives of your fellow countrymen and children so little and are willing to sacrifice them for the sake of drug traffickers whose lives you value so much more, even more than they themselves do apparently as they knowingly continue marching off on suicide missions.

The whole point of my values is that I try to adhere to them exactly when it isn't easy. Even the tricky ones like "let's not murder people in cold blood".

[Commenter_XY]

The drug dealers should find another line of work. As you can see, drug dealing can be fatal....for the dealers and distributors, too.

Take it up with Congress.

[Martinned]

Where/when has Congress said that it is OK to murder these people? (Who may or may not be involved in the drugs trade.)

[Mr. Bumble]

So, if Congress gave its permission you'd be OK with it?

[Martinned]

No, but then at least it would be (arguably) legal under US law. But lots of evil things are legal under US law.

[Mr. Bumble]

Sorry that your pure heart is upset that things you consider evil are legal under US law (like free speech and the right to bear arms, for example).

[AmosArch]

He'd rather have a 100 families dead or torn apart with untold suffering over generations than one suicidal drug dealer immediately vaporized by a predator missile instead of having their skin peeled off by a rival gang 2 months later. Bask before his enlightenment fool!

[Martinned]

At Margraten in the Netherlands 8,000 US servicement are buried and/or commemorated who losts their lives in the war against fascism in 1941-45. Among them are also black Americans, whose ability to make a contribution was severely curtailed by the segregation policies of the US army at the time. At the visitors' centre of the cemetary there used to be two panels that told that story, but those panels were removed at some point this year. Timing-wise, all we know is that:

The Heritage Foundation, a right-wing think tank, contacted the ABMC in March challenging its supposed failure to comply with Trump’s orders to cancel diversity, equality and inclusion (DEI) programmes across the US government. The ABMC placed its chief diversity officer, Priscilla Rayson, on “administrative leave” shortly afterwards.

The cemetary is given in perpetual lease to the US government, and operated by the ABMC, so the Dutch government has no say in what information is displayed for visitors, but a wide range of politicians from all over the political spectrum, locally and nationally, has been calling on the US government to reconsider.

https://www.dutchnews.nl/2025/11/mayor-calls-for-black-liberators-to-be-commemorated-at-margraten/

[Martinned]

A group of South Africans who are famous for their racism (rightly or wrongly), has called on the US Regime to shut TFU and leave them out of US culture wars.

The South African government has repeatedly tried to correct the White House, providing statistics that disprove these claims – for example the fact that Black people are by far the worst affected by violent crime and that whites still own the majority of commercial farmland – to no avail.

Now, some white Afrikaners themselves, as well as Afrikaans groups, are calling out what they say are the U.S. administration's "lies" and "falsehoods" in their name.

"We reject the narrative that casts Afrikaners as victims of racial persecution in post-apartheid South Africa," a group of over 40 prominent Afrikaners said in an open letter last month. "We are not pawns in America's culture wars."

The group included writers, journalists, musicians, university lecturers and Christian clergy.
(...)
Christo van der Rheede represented white farmers for years as head of the biggest agricultural organization in South Africa. He now leads the FW De Klerk Foundation, named for the former Afrikaans president who shared the Nobel Peace Prize with Nelson Mandela for their roles in ending apartheid.

"It is now very important for all South Africans to unite and refute the statements by President Donald Trump…that Afrikaners are being killed and slaughtered and their land and farms are being illegally confiscated. This is simply not true," van der Rheede said after Trump's G20 announcement.

https://www.npr.org/2025/11/10/nx-s1-5603421/g20-afrikaners-trump-south-africa

[Commenter_XY]

Suppose SCOTUS rules that POTUS Trump did not have the authority to impose tariffs by IEEPA.

Then what:
Does Congress pass legislation to grant the authority? Y/N
Do the markets gyrate in the absence of certainty? Y/N
Does POTUS Trump and Congress just ignore SCOTUS? Y/N

[John F. Carr]

Congress will not ratify or authorize the tariffs. They not popular enough among Republicans and many Democrats will vote no just to be anti-Trump.

The risk is priced in now. There will be market movement when the decision is released.

[Martinned]

- Trump imposes the tariffs under one of the handful of other laws that do explicitly give him that authority.

[Martinned]

So have we figured out yet why it is morally and legally OK for Trump to pardon his co-conspirators in the attempt to overturn the 2020 election result?

[Frank Drackman]

I have

[Martinned]

Chicago is still being occupied by the Regime:

I want you to understand what it is like to live in Chicago during this time.

Every day my phone buzzes. It is a neighborhood group: four people were kidnapped at the corner drugstore. A friend a mile away sends a Slack message: she was at the scene when masked men assaulted and abducted two people on the street. A plumber working on my pipes is distraught, and I find out that two of his employees were kidnapped that morning. A week later it happens again.

An email arrives. Agents with guns have chased a teacher into the school where she works. They did not have a warrant. They dragged her away, ignoring her and her colleagues’ pleas to show proof of her documentation. That evening I stand a few feet from the parents of Rayito de Sol and listen to them describe, with anguish, how good Ms. Diana was to their children. What it is like to have strangers with guns traumatize your kids. For a teacher to hide a three-year-old child for fear they might be killed. How their relatives will no longer leave the house. I hear the pain and fury in their voices, and I wonder who will be next.

Understand what it is to pray in Chicago. On September 19th, Reverend David Black, lead pastor at First Presbyterian Church of Chicago, was praying outside the ICE detention center in Broadview when a DHS agent shot him in the head with pepper balls. Pepper balls are never supposed to be fired at the head because they can seriously injure, or even kill. “We could hear them laughing as they were shooting us from the roof,” Black recalled. He is not the only member of the clergy ICE has assaulted. Methodist pastor Hannah Kardon was violently arrested on October 17th, and Baptist pastor Michael Woolf was shot with pepper balls on November 1st.

Understand what it is to sleep in Chicago. On the night of September 30th, federal agents rappelled from a Black Hawk helicopter to execute a raid on an apartment building on the South Shore. Roughly three hundred agents deployed flashbangs, busted down doors, and took people indiscriminately. US citizens, including women and children, were grabbed from their beds, marched outside without even a chance to dress, zip-tied, and loaded into vans. Residents returned to find their windows and doors broken and their belongings stolen.

Understand what it is to lead Chicago. On October 3rd, Alderperson Jesse Fuentes asked federal agents to produce a judicial warrant and allow an injured man at the hospital access to an attorney. The plainclothes agents grabbed Fuentes, handcuffed her, and took her outside the building. Her lawsuit is ongoing. On October 21st, Representative Hoan Huynh was going door-to-door to inform businesses of their immigration rights when he was attacked by six armed CBP agents, who boxed in his vehicle and pointed a gun at his face. Huynh says the agents tried to bash open his car window.

Understand what it is to live in Chicago. On October 9th, Judge Ellis issued a temporary restraining order requiring that federal agents refrain from deploying tear gas or shooting civilians without an imminent threat, and requiring two audible warnings. ICE and CBP have flaunted these court orders. On October 12th, federal agents shoved an attorney to the ground who tried to help a man being detained in Albany Park. Agents refused to identify themselves or produce a warrant, then deployed tear gas without warning. On October 14th, agents rammed a car on the East Side, then tear-gassed neighbors and police.

On October 23rd, federal agents detained seven people, including two U.S. citizens and an asylum seeker, in Little Village. Two worked for Alderperson Michael Rodriguez: his chief of staff Elianne Bahena, and police district council member Jacqueline Lopez. Again in Little Village, agents tear-gassed and pepper-sprayed protestors, seizing two high school students and a security guard, among others. Alderperson Byron Sigcho-Lopez reported that agents assaulted one of the students, who had blood on his face. On October 24th, agents in Lakeview emerged from unmarked cars, climbed a locked fence to enter a private yard, and kidnapped a construction worker. As neighbors gathered, they deployed four tear gas canisters. That same day, a few blocks away, men with rifles jumped out of SUVs and assaulted a man standing at a bus stop.

“They were beating him,” said neighbor Hannah Safter. “His face was bleeding”.

They returned minutes later and attacked again. A man from the Laugh Factory, a local comedy club, had come outside with his mother and sister. “His mom put her body in between them, and one of the agents kicked her in the face”.

Understand what it is to be a family in Chicago. On October 25th, agents arrested a 70-year-old man and threw a 67-year old woman to the ground in Old Irving Park, then deployed tear gas, disrupting a children’s Halloween parade. One parent spoke to NBC news about her two-year-old child’s response to the gas. The same day, agents deployed tear gas against residents of Avondale.

“Kids dressed in Halloween costumes walking to a parade do not pose an immediate threat to the safety of a law enforcement officer. They just don’t. And you can’t use riot control weapons against them,” Judge Ellis said to Border Patrol chief Gregory Bovino.

Understand how the government speaks about Chicago. On November 3rd, paralegal Dayanne Figueroa, a US citizen, was driving to work when federal agents crashed into her car, drew their guns, and dragged her from the vehicle. Her car was left behind, coffee still in the cup holder, keys still in the car. The Department of Homeland Security blamed her, claiming she “violently resisted arrest, injuring two officers.” You can watch the video for yourself.

“All uses of force have been more than exemplary,” Bovino stated in a recent deposition. He is, as Judge Ellis put it, lying. Bovino personally threw a tear gas canister in Little Village. He claimed in a sworn deposition that he was struck in the head by a rock before throwing the canister, and when videos showed no rock, admitted that he lied about the event. When shown video of himself tackling peaceful protestor Scott Blackburn, Bovino refused to acknowledge that he tackled the man. Instead, he claimed, “That’s not a reportable use of force. The use of force was against me.”

“I find the government’s evidence to be simply not credible,” said Judge Ellis in her November 6th ruling. “The use of force shocks the conscience.”

Understand what it is to be Chicago. To carry a whistle and have the ICIRR hotline in your phone. To wake up from nightmares of shouting militiamen and guns in your face. To rehearse every day how to calmly refuse entry, how to identify a judicial warrant, how to film and narrate an assault. To wake to helicopters buzzing your home, to feel your heart rate spike at the car horns your neighbors use to alert each other to ICE and CBP enforcement. To know that perhaps three thousand of your fellow Chicagoans have been disappeared by the government, but no one really knows for sure. To know that many of those seized were imprisoned a few miles away, as many as a hundred and fifty people in a cell, denied access to food, water, sanitation, and legal representation. To know that many of these agents—masked, without badge numbers or body cams, and refusing to identify themselves—will never face justice. To wonder what they tell their children.

The masked thugs who attack my neighbors, who point guns at elected officials and shoot pastors with pepper balls, who tear-gas neighborhoods, terrify children, and drag teachers and alderpeople away in handcuffs are not unprecedented. We knew this was coming a year ago, when Trump promised mass deportations. We knew it was coming, and seventy-seven million of us voted for it anyway.

This weight presses on me every day. I am flooded with stories. There are so many I cannot remember them all; cannot keep straight who was gassed, beaten, abducted, or shot. I write to leave a record, to stare at the track of the tornado. I write to leave a warning. I write to call for help.

I want you to understand, regardless of your politics, the historical danger of a secret police. What happens when a militia is deployed in our neighborhoods and against our own people. Left unchecked their mandate will grow; the boundaries of acceptable identity and speech will shrink. I want you to think about elections in this future. I want you to understand that every issue you care about—any hope of participatory democracy—is downstream of this.

I want you to understand what it is to love Chicago. To see your neighbors make the heartbreaking choice between showing up for work or staying safe. To march two miles long, calling out: “This is what Chicago sounds like!” To see your representatives put their bodies on the line and their voices in the fight. To form patrols to walk kids safely to school. To join rapid-response networks to document and alert your neighbors to immigration attacks. For mutual aid networks to deliver groceries and buy out street vendors so they can go home safe. To see your local journalists take the federal government to court. To talk to neighbor after neighbor, friend after friend, and hear yes, yes, it’s all hands on deck.

I want you to understand Chicago.

https://aphyr.com/posts/397-i-want-you-to-understand-chicago

[Martinned]

It's almost as if the American right has learned nothing from Abu Graib.

In interviews, however, the men sent to the prison described frequent, intense physical and psychological abuse. Beyond the beatings, tear gas and trips to the isolation room, the men said they were mocked or ignored by medical personnel, forced to spend 24 hours a day under harsh lights and made to drink from wells of fetid water.

The New York Times interviewed 40 of the former prisoners, many at their homes in cities and towns across Venezuela. We then asked a group of independent forensic experts who help investigate torture allegations to assess the credibility of the men’s testimony.

Several doctors from that team, known as the Independent Forensic Expert Group, said the men’s testimonies, along with photographs of what they described as their injuries, were consistent and credible, providing “compelling evidence” to support accusations of torture. The group’s assessments in other cases have been used in courts around the world.

https://www.nytimes.com/2025/11/08/world/americas/el-salvador-prison-migrants.html

Torturing people is wrong, regardless of whether they are (convicted) criminals. I can't believe that that really needs explaining.

[Martinned]

Hang on, I thought arresting people for "just" praying was wrong?

Federal authorities told demonstrators Friday that there would be “no more prayer” in front of or inside the Broadview ICE facility, in a move that mystified local leaders and raised legal questions.

A federal representative delivered the news to a huddle of faith leaders and activists standing outside the Immigration and Customs Enforcement facility Friday, speaking after faith leaders were denied entry to the building for the third time Friday.

Broadview Police Chief Thomas Mills, whose department helped facilitate the phone call, said that he was “trying to figure out” in discussions with Mayor Katrina Thompson and an attorney if a federal agency could legally ban religious gatherings on land owned by the village. Religious groups previously have been allowed to practice outside the facility, he said.

https://blockclubchicago.org/2025/11/07/feds-tell-faith-leaders-no-more-prayer-outside-broadview-facility/

[Mr. Bumble]

...and to all of those who served:
Happy Veterans Day!