Yes, Donald Trump is a breathtaking, dumpster fire of a President. And I could spend paragraphs recounting all of the incompetent, unbalanced and embarrassing things that he does. He is a real and present danger to the country, and like one that we have not seen in memory. But . . . the most unsettling…
Category: Politics
A short, perfect argument: “Originalism is invalid because no evidence the Founders believed in it.”
Thinking recently about questions for nominee Amy Coney Barrett, and her Originalism theory, I thought of an interesting argument — “Originalism is not a valid judicial theory because there is no evidence that the constitutional framers believed in it.” See that? How can you have a valid “Originalist” theory that the Constitution is rigidly to be…
Ah . . . too late I guess and I should have written this before about Nominee Amy Coney Barrett.
I have written two posts about suggested questions for Nominee Barrett — here and here. But watching a good deal of today’s confirmation hearing, and listening to her dodge way too many questions, I realize I should also have set out some suggested questions to highlight how thin are her qualifications to be a Supreme Court…
Nominee Barrett: How does your “originalism” theory account for Women? For African Americans?
Another in a line of proposed questions for Amy Coney Barret at the confirmation hearing. I actually think it is criminal if these questions are not asked. You are an open and staunch advocate of the “Originalism” theory of interpreting the Constitution, a theory popularly associated with your model, Justice Antonin Scalia. Originalism and Women…
Justices Breyer and Scalia debate each other. On TV. Fairly and politely.
As we all begin to turn our attention to the Supreme Court again, I came across the below YouTube video of a 2009 debate between US Supreme Court Justices Breyer and Scalia. It is a breath of fresh air and I believe it is unthinkable today. (Scalia may deserve some credit for this as he seemed to…
When did Trump know of his Covid exposure? More attention should be paid to this Rose Garden event.
Trump, his administration, and his doctors have been publicly unwilling, and contradictory, about identifying when Trump first learned — even if by a preliminary test — that he was, or potentially was, Covid positive. The most obvious tell here is that the Trump people refuse to answer when Trump last tested negative for Covid. Some have argued…
Trump brags: we haven’t YET had the millions of deaths that we will under my herd immunity approach
Recently, Trump (a latest Covid case) claimed credit, and gave himself an “A+,” on his Covid response because we only have 200,000 plus deaths when models predicted 2 to 3 million deaths if we all did nothing in response. (Yes, that’s an amazing argument.) But that same number, 2 to 3 million, is the number of projected deaths if we pursued a “herd…
Don't allow Republicans to establish a wrong assumption that courts will decide the election
Republicans have done a very good job of framing this next election as automatically going to the courts to potentially pick a winner. But normally the losing candidate only gets to ask for a recount. He or she does not have some freestanding right for a court to decide the election. So, the really critical question is:…
72% of Justices appointed before Trump supported Roe. Does Barrett accept any limits on her power?
I’d like to crowd source reaction to the following proposed list of questions — because we don't have much time to prepare for confirmation hearings. The questions are not said with hope of derailing the nominee, but recognizing (very much so) that the confirmation hearings are part of a larger political debate/audience and Dems need to make…
Psst! Where are we probably headed? A fight about recusal.
I’ve read lots of notably vague “battle plans” and delaying tactics for Democrats to employ against Republicans’ plans to confirm a replacement justice for Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg. To be frank, the talk is largely masturbatory because the Republicans have the necessary votes. There is one immediate hope: a disqualifying scandal could arise regarding Trump’s first nominee. In…
Fl. Trumpster hit 13 year old in Chest and Face with Flagpole for saying ” Biden” ( Trigger Warning)
Big Man….How cowardly and cruel can you be and people wonder why we don’t put up Biden signs without arming ourselves? I saw this on another blog and now the Trumpsters are now attacking our children. Freedom of speech? That parent would and should have stood their ground. YOU DON”T ATTACK CHILDREN. Attacking a child?…
Should Democrats impeach Trump after he loses re-election to prevent him from pardoning himself?
If Trump loses his re-election bid, we can reasonably count on the period from Election Day until Inaugaration Day (Nov. 3, 2020 to Jan. 20, 2021) to be one of the most perilous, corrupt and weird periods in U.S. history. One thing that seems certain is that Trump will attempt to pardon himself. It is an open legal question (maybe)…
The Hidden Genius In The Democrats Unemployment “Bridge” Payments
The problem with any natural disaster, whether it be wildfire, tornado, hurricane, or global pandemic, is that the immediacy of dealing with the disaster obviously commands all attention. And the longer the disaster persists, the longer attention is focused solely on the disaster. And things that would have been obvious at the time, if only…
We need to find a new word for “Orwellian.”
Just a short note on Trump’s latest threat to veto a defense spending bill because it calls for renaming certain military bases named after Confederate Civil War generals. The White House put out a statement defending the threat: “President Trump has been clear in his opposition to politically motivated attempts like this to rewrite history…
The Mutiny Of “The Bounty”
When the history of the 2020 election is written, it is the story broken by the New York Times, chronicling the scheme hatched by Vlad the Imp to pay a bounty for the lives of US soldiers in Afghanistan that may well have been the final nail in the Trump reelection coffin. For generations now,…
How will Trump's rallies be covered the second time – now that they are also a public health threat?
Trump is pressing to resume shortly his regular “rallies” — with thousands packed in an arena despite the Covid pandemic. This brings to mind the wide, post-mortem soul-searching among the press for giving so much uncritical, long broadcasts of Trump’s rallies in the 2016 election. As just one example in “My Shared Shame: The Media Helped…
WTF is wrong with the White House press corps?
On the one hand, this is a bizarre, inexplicable story. On the other hand, it is probably the most revealing story about the failure and obsequiousness of the White House press. In short, looking to fuel their fantasy propaganda that the Covid pandemic is over, White House aides at Trump’s Rose Garden appearance today moved the…
Trump is a dumpster fire. But have any of your Republican friends admitted that to you?
Trump’s unfitness for office, and his destruction of government institutions and norms, is positively cartoonish in its obviousness and threat. But — three years in — have any of your Republican friends admitted that to you? It is a really important question because as bad as Trump is, the long term threat to the country consists of…
We are in deep trouble as long as 35% to 45% of the country remains committed to idiocy
I clicked on the below Super Bowl halftime interview of frmr. President Obama by Bill O’Reilly because I remembered that it got some notice at the time for how often O’Reilly interrupted and talked over Pres. Obama. But watching it is also both a time capsule and a time machine. Particularly after the Republican silence regarding Trump’s malfeasance,…
Paul Waldman states the obvious: Trump isn't doing anything to address the economic crisis either
Paul Waldman at The Washington Post notes the obvious thing to say, yet no one says it. Trump has no economic recovery plan either: [Trump] kept searching for a “miracle,” either that the virus would just vanish or that something like hydroxychloroquine would solve the problem and take it off his hands. Now that it’s clear…
