US politics: just for you

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

10 minutes ago, Gaston de Foix said:

There were obvious standing problems in the case, but part of the problem was also that certain stipulations were agreed by Colorado as an agreed set of facts.  Gorsuch relied heavily on them to short-circuit the legal requirements and grant an advisory opinion.  This is not new, it happened with Coach Kennedy last year, and there were similar problems with Moore v Harper that Roberts ignored to resolve that issue now rather than later.  At the end of the day, the Court does what it wants. 

The Court has ignored standing when it suited them.  I was surprised (and pleased) when Moore v. Harper got ride of the “Independent State Legislature” doctrine ignoring the technical mootness of the Case given the NC Supreme Court’s reversal of its earlier ruling.

[Luzifer's right hand]

Is there a word for rule by judges?

Just kidding though as they are owned by the oligarchs anyway.

Edited July 1, 2023 by Luzifer's right hand

[Gaston de Foix]

2 minutes ago, Luzifer's right hand said:

Is there a word for rule by judges?

Kritarchy. 

[Gaston de Foix]

9 minutes ago, Ser Scot A Ellison said:

The Court has ignored standing when it suited them.  I was surprised (and pleased) when Moore v. Harper got ride of the “Independent State Legislature” doctrine ignoring the technical mootness of the Case given the NC Supreme Court’s reversal of its earlier ruling.

Yeah, and it can be fairly be said that the liberal judges all ignored the mootness problem when it suited them.  The most important thing is to break the ratchet to the right that has been happening for the last 54 years since Abe Fortas resigned on 14 May 1969.  That requires winning three presidential elections in a row (and winning the senate 2028-2034).  

Edited July 1, 2023 by Gaston de Foix

[Zorral]

2 hours ago, Luzifer's right hand said:

Is there a word for rule by judges?

Just kidding though as they are owned by the oligarchs anyway.

https://www.jewishhistory.org/era-of-the-judges/  The Sopetim -- the Time of the Judges.

[Altherion]

Amusingly enough, Biden has mostly managed to nullify his agreement to end the pause and resume payments in October. I say "mostly" because technically the payments are still due and, importantly, interest will accrue, but given the administration's statement, it's highly likely that many people will still not pay:

Quote

The Secretary of Education initiated a rulemaking process aimed at opening an alternative path to debt relief for as many working and middle-class borrowers as possible, using the Secretary’s authority under the Higher Education Act.
 
The Department of Education (Department) finalized the most affordable repayment plan ever created, ensuring that borrowers will be able to take advantage of this plan this summer—before loan payments are due. Many borrowers will not have to make monthly payments under this plan. Those that do will save more than $1,000 a year.

In addition, to protect the most vulnerable borrowers from the worst consequences of missed payments following the payment restart, the Department is instituting a 12-month “on-ramp” to repayment, running from October 1, 2023 to September 30, 2024, so that financially vulnerable borrowers who miss monthly payments during this period are not considered delinquent, reported to credit bureaus, placed in default, or referred to debt collection agencies.

So basically, there's no penalty of any kind for not making payments except that interest will accrue... but on the other hand, it's entirely possible that some fraction of the loan (or even the whole thing) might be cancelled so it's not clear that the people who owe less than $10K ought to pay anything at all.

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

Given the statutory ability to “modify” loans.  Couldn’t the Administration cancel all existing interest and future interest?  It’s not complete forgiveness but it is a significant benefit.

[Altherion]

39 minutes ago, Ser Scot A Ellison said:

Given the statutory ability to “modify” loans.  Couldn’t the Administration cancel all existing interest and future interest?  It’s not complete forgiveness but it is a significant benefit.

That's basically what they did with the new repayment plan. From the same statement:

Quote

Specifically, the plan will:

• For undergraduate loans, cut in half the amount that borrowers have to pay each month from 10% to 5% of discretionary income.
• Raise the amount of income that is considered non-discretionary income and therefore is protected from repayment, guaranteeing that no borrower earning under 225% of the federal poverty level—about the annual equivalent of a $15 minimum wage for a single borrower—will have to make a monthly payment under this plan.
• Forgive loan balances after 10 years of payments, instead of 20 years, for borrowers with original loan balances of $12,000 or less. The Department estimates that this reform will allow nearly all community college borrowers to be debt-free within 10 years.
• Not charge borrowers with unpaid monthly interest, so that unlike other existing income-driven repayment plans, no borrower’s loan balance will grow as long as they make their monthly payments—even when that monthly payment is $0 because their income is low.

All student borrowers in repayment will be eligible to enroll in the SAVE plan.

 

[Tywin et al.]

3 hours ago, Gaston de Foix said:

That requires winning three presidential elections in a row (and winning the senate 2028-2034).  

Which is the problem with the future of the US. The country is slowly moving left, but structurally the right has electoral advantages and instead of moderating they're getting more extreme. They know the courts are their best hope so they're flooding them with unqualified ideologues. And nothing about this is going to change for decades and chances are it will probably just get worse and worse each year.  

The hard truth is there isn't a positive outlook for the US, On the micro level you can still have a nice life if you make good money and generally conform, but the country overall is pretty fucked and that's before we even factor in the climate. 

[Larry of the Lawn]

3 hours ago, Tywin et al. said:

Which is the problem with the future of the US. The country is slowly moving left, but structurally the right has electoral advantages and instead of moderating they're getting more extreme. They know the courts are their best hope so they're flooding them with unqualified ideologues. And nothing about this is going to change for decades and chances are it will probably just get worse and worse each year.  

The hard truth is there isn't a positive outlook for the US, On the micro level you can still have a nice life if you make good money and generally conform, but the country overall is pretty fucked and that's before we even factor in the climate. 

Is the country truly slowly moving left, or is that just something people like to say? 

There's been leftward movement on a few issues, others not so much. 

[Tywin et al.]

11 minutes ago, Larry of the Lake said:

Is the country truly slowly moving left, or is that just something people like to say? 

There's been leftward movement on a few issues, others not so much. 

Overall people's opinions are, but the political class isn't reflecting it because in large part so many of them are bought by a small group that is largely opposed to the changing trends. And the nice part about buying people on the court is they never have to answer for it. 

[karaddin]

I'm not a lawyer but surely fabricating an interaction for the sake of giving you standing to challenge a law should at least be perjury at the point it's revealed you made the whole thing up? The case still standing because no one at any of those courts actually verified the claim used for standing is shit, but surely lying to the court is lying to the court?

[Gaston de Foix]

9 hours ago, karaddin said:

I'm not a lawyer but surely fabricating an interaction for the sake of giving you standing to challenge a law should at least be perjury at the point it's revealed you made the whole thing up? The case still standing because no one at any of those courts actually verified the claim used for standing is shit, but surely lying to the court is lying to the court?

Yes, it is.  The facts are complicated than that though about this issue. 

At some point the ADF was thinking about bringing an actual denial of service action under the First Amendment.  What they actually did was bring a pre-enforcement challenge to Colorado's law.  So that cause of action (or even possibly, separate claim) was dropped.  Colorado should have done more due diligence before entering into the stipulations it did in this case and (a) identified this fraud; (b) identified the vehicle problems with this plaintiff.  They didn't, and they did a pretty poor job of lawyering this case before a hostile Court.  

But none of that truly matters, because the DOJ intervened and Brian Fletcher (I believe) did a masterful job arguing before the Court.  The reality is that Masterpiece was a fudge that satisfied no one and RBG's replacement by ACB gave the conservatives the outcome they wanted (as well as Brett Kavanaugh replacing Kennedy giving conservatives the sixth reliable vote).  

[Rippounet]

On 7/1/2023 at 3:48 AM, Mlle. Zabzie said:

Mind you, I don’t think the wealth tax is constitutional, and I have severe doubts about the book minimum tax as currently enacted, but next term’s Moore would be far, far more expansive.   

Quite possibly. On the US constitution, Karl Polanyi wrote:

The separation of powers, which Montesquieu (1748) had [...] invented, was now used to separate the people from power over their own economic life. The American Constitution, shaped in a farmer-craftsman's environment by a leadership forewarned by the English industrial scene, isolated the economic sphere entirely from the jurisdiction of the Constitution, put private property thereby under the highest conceivable protection, and created the only legally grounded market society in the world. In spite of universal suffrage, American voters were powerless against owners.

22 hours ago, Luzifer's right hand said:

Is there a word for rule by judges?

"A government of judges" is a famous phrase coined by a French law professor a hundred years ago to describe conservative judicial activism.

[Wilbur]

No one should be shocked to learn that Trump called former Arizona governor Doug Ducey, telling him to identify 10,000 fraudulent votes, and also told former VP Pence to do the same.

Ten thousand fraudulent votes.  In a state election that we (Republicans) operate.  What a moron.

[Tywin et al.]

1 hour ago, Wilbur said:

No one should be shocked to learn that Trump called former Arizona governor Doug Ducey, telling him to identify 10,000 fraudulent votes, and also told former VP Pence to do the same.

Ten thousand fraudulent votes.  In a state election that we (Republicans) operate.  What a moron.

I said before, the call to GA's SoS was unlikely to be an isolated event. Now just imagine if a Democrat did the same thing...

[Gaston de Foix]

9 hours ago, Wilbur said:

No one should be shocked to learn that Trump called former Arizona governor Doug Ducey, telling him to identify 10,000 fraudulent votes, and also told former VP Pence to do the same.

Ten thousand fraudulent votes.  In a state election that we (Republicans) operate.  What a moron.

And yet, according to newspaper reports, Jack Smith hasn't interviewed Ducey.  The investigative incompetence of the DOJ continues to be mind blowing.  

[Martell Spy]

Michael Imperioli forbids ‘bigots and homophobes’ from watching his work following Supreme Court ruling

https://www.cnn.com/2023/07/02/entertainment/michael-imperioli-supreme-court/index.html

Quote

 

Actor Michael Imperioli has something to say about the Supreme Court’s Friday ruling in favor of a Christian web designer who refuses to create websites to celebrate same-sex weddings.

“I’ve decided to forbid bigots and homophobes from watching The Sopranos, The White Lotus, Goodfellas or any movie or tv show I’ve been in,” Imperioli said in the caption of a post on his Instagram page Saturday, adding “Thank you Supreme Court for allowing me to discriminate and exclude those who I don’t agree with and am opposed to. USA! USA!”

 

 

[Wilbur]

4 hours ago, Gaston de Foix said:

And yet, according to newspaper reports, Jack Smith hasn't interviewed Ducey.  The investigative incompetence of the DOJ continues to be mind blowing.  

I imagine the reason that this has emerged into the news is that some government entity has deposed someone in the Ducey administration, and that person now feels safe to let the cat out of the bag.

It may not have been the Jack Smith independent counsel activity, but someone in some prosecutorial persona surely has begun the process of collecting evidence.  Who, though?

Based on our local political landscape, I wonder if some normal Republican who was in the Ducey administration at the end has been talking to Kris Mayes.  She is the AZ AG, and she has served on the Corporate Commission for eight years in the past, so she would have working relationships with AZ executive branch Republicans.  This is my own supposition, I have no idea or actual knowledge.

[Gaston de Foix]

2 hours ago, Wilbur said:

I imagine the reason that this has emerged into the news is that some government entity has deposed someone in the Ducey administration, and that person now feels safe to let the cat out of the bag.

It may not have been the Jack Smith independent counsel activity, but someone in some prosecutorial persona surely has begun the process of collecting evidence.  Who, though?

Based on our local political landscape, I wonder if some normal Republican who was in the Ducey administration at the end has been talking to Kris Mayes.  She is the AZ AG, and she has served on the Corporate Commission for eight years in the past, so she would have working relationships with AZ executive branch Republicans.  This is my own supposition, I have no idea or actual knowledge.

Possibly.  Here's the story: https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2023/07/01/trump-2020-election-arizona-governor-doug-ducey/

Whether Jack Smith & Co. are belatedly now on the scene or no, the fact is post Jan 6 2021, the DOJ was inexplicably sleeping because QUOTE "IT WAS AFRAID OF LOOKING POLITICAL" END QUOTE.  

We should call Merriam-Webster and have them replace the definition of pusillanimous with a photo of Garland.  Just a disgrace.  

If local prosecutors were investigating and have found relevant facts, good for them.  Those facts may never come into the public domain though absent a prosecutorial charging decision.