That Which Can Be Destroyed by the Truth, Should Be

A local activist in Arkansas filed an FOI request to the state PUC about a what Entergy was doing with regard to Google's efforts to secure power for their planned data center in West Memphis, Arkansas.

It appears that she got more than what the utility company intended. 

The short version:

Google appears to be paying only a third of the cost for new electric infrastructure, not the full amount, as Entergy has said.

Yes, these documents appear to undermine Entergy’s claims that customers won’t pay higher bills to support data centers

Details of Google’s West Memphis site’s massive power draw are revealed. [Google would be using all of the energy from a solar installation that it was touting.]

In response to this data being released, Entergy filed suit asking for a restraining order preventing the news media from writing about this information, something which a Federal Judge promptly denied.

Entergy claimed that the documents revealed trade secrets, but the fact that Entergy plans to screw its rate-payers is simply not a secret.  It never has been. 

Good 4th Amendment News

Following the Supreme Court ruling in Chatrie v. United States, which said that a geofence search  required a judicial warrant, a judge has ruled that tower dumps warrants are unconstitutional.

Five weeks after the Supreme Court struck down so-called geofence searches in its landmark Fourth Amendment decision in Chatrie v. United States, the ramifications for other broad law enforcement investigative techniques are coming into focus. On Wednesday, August 5, U.S. District Judge Carlton Reeves reaffirmed a magistrate judge’s ruling quashing federal law enforcement’s ability to obtain “tower dump” warrants.

Judge Reeves’ decision in the Southern District of Mississippi may signal a turning point in the post-Chatrie era against non individualized electronic searches. Both state and federal law enforcement authorities have commonly used tower dumps to pull large amounts of data from cell towers located near crime scenes. The data, which reveals the cell phones connected to a cell tower during a set time block, has historically allowed investigators to examine recurring cell numbers at multiple crime scenes.

Last year, investigators with the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives successfully used a tower dump to identify a man accused of a string of gun store robberies in Pennsylvania. This year, investigators asked a federal judge for approval to perform a tower dump while investigating vandalism at a Federal Aviation Administration facility in Vermont.

In the Mississippi case, FBI agents investigating a series of violent crimes committed in the Jackson area submitted four warrants for a magistrate judge’s approval in February 2025. The magistrate judge, however, denied the warrants, citing the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit’s decision in United States v. Smith, pre-dating Chatrie, striking down geofence warrants. In March 2025, the government appealed the magistrate judge’s order to Judge Reeves.

This is the sort of search that the founders specifically opposed.  

These were called, "General Warrants," or, "Writs of Assistance."

6 — 3 (More like 5½ — 3½)

The Supreme Court just came frighteningly close to invalidating a Constitutional amendment because Donald Trump wanted them to.

I am, of course referring to their ruling on the birthright citizenship case, where 5 justices said that the black letter text of the US Constitution said what it said, 1 justice said that federal law would have to be changed, and 3 justices wanted to give Trump a blank check. (How I get to 5½ — 3½)

The Supreme Court on Tuesday affirmed the principle that almost everyone born on U.S. soil is a citizen, a major decision that rejects a push by President Donald Trump to fundamentally redefine who is American in ways not seen for more than 150 years.

The justices struck down an executive order by the president that said citizenship would not be granted to children born to parents who are in the country illegally or those on temporary visas for work, travel, school or humanitarian reasons.

Trump’s order would have had sweeping political, economic and social ramifications, changing the definition of citizenship in the most significant way since the 14th Amendment guaranteeing citizenship to formerly enslaved people was ratified shortly after the Civil War. 

The ruling reaffirms the long-settled understanding that the 14th Amendment automatically confers citizenship on any child born in the United States, with limited exceptions for children of diplomats and other rare cases. The principle was established in a landmark 1898 high court decision that found that Wong Kim Ark, a man born to Chinese immigrants in San Francisco, was a citizen. ………

Conservative Justice Brett M. Kavanaugh dissented from the 5-4 majority in ruling the executive order violated the 14th Amendment, but he joined the 6-3 majority in finding the order violated federal law.

………

The opinion came over the objections of conservative Justices Clarence Thomas, Neil M. Gorsuch and Samuel A. Alito Jr.

Alito wrote a dissent, while Thomas wrote another that Gorsuch joined.

Alito said birthright citizenship acts as a magnet drawing migrants to the United States to give birth so their children could be citizens, echoing an argument the Trump administration has made.

………

Thomas said the court “adds to the sad history of the Fourteenth Amendment, which was designed and understood to secure equal rights for the freed blacks but has instead been repurposed for political projects that the Reconstruction Congress did not support.”

So, Alito just let his bigot flag fly, and Thomas just showed himself to be a worse historian than he is a jurist, which is a pretty heavy lift.

Signed Into Law

The Hawaii bill which would strip corporations of the power to make corporate donations is now law.

I do expect that the Supreme Court will overrule this, probably in a shadow docket decision, before the ink on the Governor's signature is dry, but it is a good thing. 

On Thursday, Gov. Josh Green formally enacted Senate Bill 2471, now Act 11, which establishes new restrictions on political spending by corporations and other “artificial persons” established under Hawaii law.

The measure has received widespread national attention as the first major state-level challenge to the unchecked spending by Super PACs ushered in by the U.S. Supreme Court’s controversial 2010 Citizens United v. FEC decision, which established corporate spending on political advertisements as protected free speech.

“The foundation of our democracy is that political power belongs to the people,” said state Sen. Jarrett Keohokalole, who co-introduced the measure. “Corporations and other artificial entities exist because the state grants them legal privileges, including limited liability and lucrative tax benefits that individuals cannot claim. Act 011 clarifies that those privileges do not include the power to spend corporate money to influence our elections.”

The new law will almost certainly be challenged in court as a direct violation of the Supreme Court ruling but supporters contend it will withstand judicial scrutiny because its scope is limited to the terms set forth by the Hawaii State Constitution regarding the powers granted by the state to the entities it creates and their limitations.

In essence, Act 011 clarifies that artificial entities created under state law possess only those powers necessary or convenient to carry out their lawful business or organizational purposes. The law specifies that those powers do not include spending money or contributing anything of value to influence elections or ballot measures.

Act 011 applies to a range of entities organized or authorized to do business under Hawaii law, including corporations, nonprofit corporations, limited liability companies, limited partnerships, limited liability partnerships, and certain associations. It also authorizes the attorney general and the director of Commerce and Consumer Affairs to impose penalties or bring enforcement actions for violations.

Hopefully, this scares the hell out of the Snollygoster Six on the Supreme Court.

More is coming. 

Start With, "He Burnt a Cross Next to a Police Station as a Young Adult"

Charles Murray is a racist hypocrite dirt-bag, but for some reason, whenever writes, people thing that he is wise.

Whether it is The Bell Curve, wherein he used fudged data and statistics to "Show" that blacks were genetically inferior, or his latest screed, saying that the Electoral College is a core founding structure of the Republic, he's a complete wanker.

When I came across William Hogeland devastating take-down of Murray's latest, I noticed an omission, he neglected to note that Murray is also a cross burning racist, something that he has never apologized for.  (He claims that he did not know what a cross burning meant.  Bullsh%$.)

I highly recommend that you read the essay, but Murray's past should be the lede on any article about him.

Ignoring Article 1 of the Constitution

After the House refused to pass the Senate bill funding the Department of Homeland Security, Donald Trump has issued an executive order to pay them anyway.

The exclusive role of the Congress in funding the government is Constitution 101, but Trump ignored this, and the New York Times buried the lede on this, it's mentioned in passing in the 9th paragraph out of 13.

President Trump on Friday signed a directive calling on his administration to pay all Department of Homeland Security employees, an effort to circumvent congressional gridlock and end the record-long shutdown of an agency tasked with protecting the country.

………

The Friday order came after House Republicans refused to clear a Senate plan that would have restored funding to the agency, prolonging the shutdown. Mr. Trump earlier this week had hinted that he would sign a directive calling for all Department of Homeland Security employees to be paid, as he criticized Democrats for their role in the impasse. The president signed a similar memo last week ordering the department to pay Transportation Security Administration officials after about 60,000 employees from the agency had to report for work without pay for weeks. 

………

The workaround could face legal scrutiny, since it is the role of Congress to be the arbiter of federal spending. Mr. Trump’s directive could be seen as an attempt to unilaterally circumvent that responsibility, weakening the legislative branch’s ability to hold the executive branch accountable.

………

The impasse began in February when Senate Democrats refused to support funding for immigration agencies without new constraints on immigration officers.

Weeks later, the Senate sent a plan to the House that funded the Department of Homeland Security, except the immigration agencies. It omitted the restrictions Democrats had sought on federal agents.

Hard-right Republicans declined to support a Senate agreement to fund the department because it excluded money for immigration enforcement agencies.

(emphasis mine) 

Trump's actions are clearly unlawful, and all we get in this story is equivocation ¾ of the way down.

Bad news, and bad journalism. 

Wagging the Dog

First, I would note that anyone relying on US mainstream media for their information is a moron. 

Between the Epstein files, persistent concerns about his health, and plummeting poll numbers it's pretty clear why Donald Trump authorized the abduction of Nicolas Maduro and his wife and strikes on Venezuela.

It had nothing to do with drugs, particularly not Fentanyl.

The fact that Trump has also explicitly stated his goal was to steal Venezuelan oil is part of that as well.

Maduro is now in custody in the US (Update: MDC Brooklyn.)

Trump is claiming that the United States is, "Now running Venezuela," though I would think that the Vice President of Venezuela and their Defense Minister differ on this matter,

The US attacked Venezuela and captured its long-serving president Nicolás Maduro on Saturday, with Donald Trump promising to put the country under American control for now, even as Venezuelan officials vowed defiance.

As part of a dramatic overnight operation that knocked out electricity in parts of Caracas, US Special Forces captured Maduro in or near one of his safe houses, Trump said.


With Maduro in US custody, “we will run the country until such time as we can do a safe, proper and judicious transition”, the US president said during a press conference at his Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida.

“We can’t take a chance that someone else takes over Venezuela who doesn’t have the interests of Venezuelans in mind.”

………

But a few hours later, the president’s claim was undermined by Rodríguez, who, in a televised address, maintained the critical tone adopted by all members of Maduro’s cabinet since the first reports of the US bombardment.

She described the US attack as an “unprecedented military aggression”, and demanded the “immediate release” of Maduro and his wife. The Venezuelan people “are outraged by the illegal and illegitimate kidnapping of the president and the first lady”, Rodríguez said.

The Venezuelan vice-president insisted that the country “will never again be anyone’s colony – neither of old empires, nor of new empires, nor of empires in decline”.

She also echoed an argument repeatedly made by Maduro before his capture: that the real objective of the four-month-long US military pressure had never been a supposed “war on drugs”, but rather “regime change” and the “seizure of our energy, mineral and natural resources”.

With little in the way of US ground troops in the area, I'm not sure how this is going to play out.

I'm with what Atrios said, "Look forward to Venezuela defense and retaliation being portrayed as criminal aggression."  (His hed, "Mommy, he shot me back," is prize).

Even if the current regime in Caracas capitulates, there is a very good case that it all goes pear shaped, with insurgencies and a possible civil war.

The Democratic Party House Minority Leader, part 1


The Democratic Party House Minority Leader, part 2


And the always simping to the Cuban diaspora in Florida Debbie Wasserman Schultz While Maduro is not a popular figure in Venezuela, the former eletes are even less so, so their return, accompanied by US companies seizing control of their oiil and other natural resources, will not result in any US occupying force being, "greeted as liberators,"if just because the first thing that any leader installed by trump will do is roll back public healthcare and social safety net provisions that were put in place by Chavez.

Meanwhile, the Democratic Party establishment (There is no Democratic Party establishment) is doing what they always do, and basically caving, and soft pedaling the whole thing.

Guys, you don't have to spend 60% of your talk saying how bad Maduro was.

This act, a war of choice, is against the war powers act and against the Constitution of the United States of America.

Presenting this is just some concerns about some Congressional prerogatives being stepped on is weak, stupid, and bad politics. 

In related corruption news, it appears that someone close to the Trump administration created an account on the Polymarket betting site and netted a quick  $½ million.

Econoimists can blather all they want about the value of predictive markets, but this is just corrupt as hell.

In the best of circumstances, betting on world events for fun and profit on marketplaces like Kalshi and Polymarket is an innocent way to make reading the news a little more interesting. Unfortunately, some suspect there are rascals out there who want to ruin it for everyone else by placing unfair, insider bets with the potential to corrupt the motives of powerful figures and their advisors. So with that in mind, when I say this next thing, I don’t want you to be suspicious:


On Friday, something that very much looks like a brand new account on Polymarket plowed $30,000 into bets on the toppling of Venezuelan president Nicolás Maduro. By the very next morning, when Maduro was suddenly no longer able to act as president of Venezuela anymore due to having been dragged out of his bed by the U.S. military and spirited out of his country, that account had apparently bagged $436,759.61 according to Axios’s Herb Scribner. It’s not spelled out where that number is coming from, but an archive.ph snapshot being circulated on social media places the amount at $407,920.12, so either way, this lucky person made a lot of money off their totally wild guess.

About the only thing clear in this entire thing is that, to paraphrase Mitchell and Web, the USA is the baddie here,

One thing that is certain though, we are going to see a wave of migrants heading toward the United States to get away from this developing mess.

I wonder how that will play to Trump's MAGAt supporters. 

This is Nuts

Donald Trump is claiming that he has pardoned Tina Peters, the former county clerk of Mesa County, Colorado, who was convicted of convicted of three counts of attempting to influence a public servant, one count of conspiracy to commit criminal impersonation, first-degree official misconduct, violation of duty and failing to comply with the secretary of state, and sentenced to 9 years in prison.

She did all this in an attempt to create false evidence of a "stolen" election in 2020. 

With all of the pardons that Trump is issuing lately, my reader(s) might wonder why this pardon is noteworthy.

It's pretty simple.  All of the above charges are State charges, and the President has no authority to do so.  (Well, at least he lacks the authority until the six corrupt Supreme Court Justices make yet another ruling rivaling the awfulness oif Dred Scott v. Sanford.)

Unfortunately, the so-called journalist out there are selling it as a, "Some experts say," as opposed to it being bat-shit insane, because there has been too much in the way of media mergers:

President Donald Trump said Thursday that he has pardoned Tina Peters, a former county clerk in Colorado who was convicted in state court on felony charges related to efforts to overturn the 2020 presidential election.

“Democrats have been relentless in their targeting of TINA PETERS, a Patriot who simply wanted to make sure that our Elections were Fair and Honest,” wrote Trump in a post on Truth Social. “Today I am granting Tina a full Pardon for her attempts to expose Voter Fraud in the Rigged 2020 Presidential Election!”

It was unclear whether Trump was asserting that he has the power to free Peters from state prison. She is serving a nine-year sentence. Presidents have the power to pardon defendants convicted in federal courts, but previous presidents have not claimed that authority in a state case.

Unclear?  Seriously? 

………

The Constitution gives the president the power “to grant Reprieves and Pardons for Offenses against the United States.” The Supreme Court has interpreted that language as referring to federal crimes, not those charged by states.

In a lengthy letter to Trump this month, however, Ticktin disputed that traditional understanding.

“The issue which needs to be answered whether our founders understood or intended when they wrote that the President had the Power to Pardon offenses against the United States, if it meant the states or only the federal government. Did they mean the one central authority, or did they mean the plural, meaning the states which were united?” he wrote.

Ticktin conceded that the claim that the president could pardon people for state crimes “has never been raised in any court” but said Trump should assert that authority in Peters’s case.

It's never been raised in court because the argument is complete bullshit.

Anyone who is a serious journalist should be calling that bullshit out.  This Washington Post reporter clearly is not serioius. 

Remember What the Praetorian Guard did to Caligula?

It appears that national guard troops assigned to occupy Washington, DC are convinced that they are serving no national security purpose at all.

I could have told you that.

The descriptions of troops thinking that they are, leveraging fear," creating a, "Wedge between citizens and the military," and making the troops deployed feel, "shame," is interesting.

Given the, "Warrior Ethos," ⃰ promulgated by all branches of the service, this is actually profoundly worrying.

One of the motivations for a military coup is the sense among the military that they have been shamed or demeaned.

As to what happens in the United States?  ¯\_(ツ)_/¯   

^*I strongly object to this training. They are not warriors, they are soldiers.
Soldiers take a town and eliminate resistance and then minimize casualties to civilians.
Warriors, on the other hand, at least in the case of the ancient Greeks, were expected to dash any male toddler's brains out on the cobblestones upon taking a town.

So, How Corrupt is the Supreme Court?

We're about to find out, because the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit, I normally refer to them as the "Patent Court", but they cover international trade as well, has ruled that Donald Trump has no authority to implement tariffs.

The legal reasoning is fairly straightforward, if one looks at the black letter of the Constitution, only Congress can levy taxes, which includes tariffs, and in all cases where the Congress has given the President the authority to act on their behalf, they have explicitly listed them in the language of the bill.

The International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA) has no mention of tariffs at all.

The injunction has been stayed until October to allow for an appeal to the Supreme Court.

The real question here is whether or not the Supreme Court will ignore the Constitution in order to more deeply fellate Donald Trump.

I expect a 5-4 or 6-3 decision in his favor. 

And the First Group of People to Start Ignoring Supreme Court Rulings Are………

The lower federal courts, who are doing a pretty good job of imitating Andrew Jackson (Justice Marshall has made his decision, now let him enforce it.)

We now have a 3rd ruling basically ignoring Trump v. CASA, where the Supreme Court ruled that Trump's executive order revoking birthright citizenship would stand until appeals are exhausted.

In the past two years, we have had two rulings that rival Dredd ScotT v. Sanford in their corruption, partizanship and lawlessness.  (The other one was Trump v. United States)

A third court ruled Friday that President Trump’s birthright citizenship executive order cannot go into effect across the country, following the Supreme Court’s decision last month clawing back nationwide injunctions.

U.S. District Judge Leo Sorokin, an appointee of former President Obama, found that the nationwide injunction he granted to more than a dozen states remains in effect because “no workable, narrower alternative” would provide the plaintiffs full relief — an exception laid out in the Supreme Court’s ruling.

“Despite the defendants’ chosen path, the Court — aided substantially by the plaintiffs’ meticulous factual and legal submissions — undertook the review required of it by CASA and considered anew whether its original order swept too broadly,” Sorokin wrote in a 23-page opinion, referencing the high court decision.

“After careful consideration of the law and the facts, the Court answers that question in the negative,” he said.

Sorokin’s decision follows rulings by another district court and an appellate panel of judges that also allowed blocks on Trump’s order to remain in place for states.

The Supreme Court's credibility and power are on a knife edge, and most of its members are not even aware of this.

Hubris Ate Nemesis 

It Does Seem to be Constitution 101

The U.S. Court of International Trade has ruled that Donald Trump lacks the authority to imposed tariffs, which does seem to be a rather straightforward reading of the Constitution, which very clearly assigns taxing authority to Congress.

A panel of federal judges on Wednesday blocked President Trump from imposing some of his steepest tariffs on China and other U.S. trading partners, finding that federal law did not grant him “unbounded authority” to tax imports from nearly every country around the world.

The ruling, by the U.S. Court of International Trade, delivered an early yet significant setback to Mr. Trump, undercutting his primary leverage as he looks to pressure other nations into striking trade deals more beneficial to the United States.

Before Mr. Trump took office, no president had sought to invoke the International Emergency Economic Powers Act, a 1977 law, to impose tariffs on other nations. The law, which primarily concerns trade embargoes and sanctions, does not even mention tariffs.

But Mr. Trump adopted a novel interpretation of its powers as he announced, and then suspended, high levies on scores of countries in April. He also used the law to impose tariffs on products from Canada and Mexico in return for what he said was their role in sending fentanyl to the United States.

Yeah, great job normalizing bat=sh%$ insane and clearly unconstitutional behavior.

The decision has been stayed by the appellate court, which is not a surprise, as this is clearly going to the Supreme Court, where the results should be a slam dunk for the opponents of the tariffs, if one assumes that the justices are neither corrupt nor political partisans.

Of course, since 6 of the current Justices are corrupt political partisans, so I'm not sure as to the likelihood of an honest ruling.

Some Good News, Though

A federal court has ruled that the abuse of section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act is unconstitutional.

The court actually ruled in December, but it's only now being made public:

It's official: The FBI's warrantless searches of communications seized to protect US national security have at last been ruled unconstitutional and in violation of the Fourth Amendment.

In a major December ruling made public this week, US District Judge LaShann DeArcy Hall settled one of the biggest debates about feared government overreach that has prompted calls to reform Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) for more than a decade.

Critics' primary concern was whether the FBI needed a warrant to search and query Americans' communications that are often incidentally, inadvertently, or mistakenly seized during investigations of suspected foreign terrorists.

The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), a digital rights group that has long said a warrant is needed to conduct such invasive searches, celebrated the ruling as "better late than never." The EFF noted that the FBI conducted 3.4 million warrantless searches of US persons' 702 data in 2021, describing it as a "routine practice" and calling out Section 702 as a "finders keepers" rule that for years has seemingly given feds' unfettered access to many Americans' private and sensitive communication data.

DeArcy Hall agreed with an appeals court that ruled that "the government cannot circumvent application of the warrant requirement simply because queried information is already collected and held by the government," as the US unsuccessfully tried to argue.

I expect this to go all the way to the US Supreme Court, and I have no fucking clue as to how they would rule.

It is clear that the FBI has been abusing the process, which is not a surprise.

It's what cops do.

The Call Is Coming from Inside the House

Despite extreme efforts by Chief Justice John Roberts, the discussions that shot down meaningful ethics rules for the Supreme Court have leaked.

Unsurprisingly, it was 3 conservative justices, Gorsuch, Thomas, and Alito, who objected to any ethics rules at all:

As the summer of 2023 ended, the justices of the U.S. Supreme Court began trading even-more-confidential-than-usual memos, avoiding their standard email list and instead passing paper documents in envelopes to each chambers. Faced with ethics controversies and a plunge in public trust, they were debating rules for their own conduct, according to people familiar with the process.

Weeks later, as a united front, they announced the results: the court’s first-ever ethics code. “It’s remarkable that we were able to agree unanimously,” Justice Neil M. Gorsuch said in a television interview this year.

But a New York Times examination found that behind the scenes, the court had divided over whether the justices’ new rules could — or should — ever be enforced.

Justice Gorsuch was especially vocal in opposing any enforcement mechanism beyond voluntary compliance, arguing that additional measures could undermine the court. The justices’ strength was their independence, he said, and he vowed to have no part in diminishing it.

In the private exchanges, Justice Clarence Thomas, whose decision not to disclose decades of gifts and luxury vacations from wealthy benefactors had sparked the ethics controversy, and Justice Samuel A. Alito Jr. wrote off the court’s critics as politically motivated and unappeasable.

No Sam, you, and your fellow justice Clarence, are corrupt sons of bitches. 

One of your fellow justices is leaking this, because they know corruption when you see it.

………

To piece together the previously undisclosed debate, The Times interviewed people from inside and outside the court, including liberals and conservatives, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss the proceedings and the justices’ thinking. This article also draws upon public statements by the justices, who declined to comment.

I'm calling bullsh%$ on this paragraph.  If they were passing memos around in sealed envelopes on paper, the only way that anyone got this, and then got this to the New York Times is for one of the justices to either leak it themselves, or to make this available to staff who they knew who would leak to the press.

I understand why this paragraph is there, the Times is trying to sow confusion as to the source, but this story had to come from a Justice.

………

The discussions were treated with extra secrecy because they were so sensitive, according to people from the court. Instead of the usual legal issues, the justices were contending with controversy about finances and gifts from friends, and some of the ground rules of their own institution.

For years, Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. had resisted efforts to hold the court to the same ethics rules that bind all other federal judges. In addition to the longstanding code, those judges can rely on a committee that dispenses advice. Any ethics complaints that arise are routed to chief circuit judges, who can convene other judges to investigate, and if necessary, take actions that range from discreet warning to censure.

All 50 states have avenues for examining complaints about members of their highest courts. On Monday, Senator Sheldon Whitehouse, a Democrat from Rhode Island, released a report detailing how state supreme court members are subject to ethics oversight. 

The Supreme Court cannot enforce its own ethics.  I don't mean shouldn't, I mean that they cannot.

Ethics enforcement without an empowered and independent watchdog is not possible. (Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?)

The Constitution gives Congress explicit authority to regulate the courts, including the Supreme Court.

Congress should set up an independent watchdog for the entire federal court system, including SCOTUS.

Speaking of Handcuffs

How is it that Ron DeSantis is making against TV stations carrying ads that he does not like not a criminal conspiracy to violate those stations civil rights?

A federal judge feels similarly, though he did not break out the cuffs:

A federal judge ordered Gov. Ron DeSantis’ state Health Department to stop threatening television stations with criminal prosecution if they kept running ads in favor of an abortion amendment on the ballot next month.

In a sharply worded ruling on Thursday, U.S. District Judge Mark Walker rebuked the DeSantis administration for trying to quash what he called constitutionally protected political speech.

“To keep it simple for the State of Florida: it’s the First Amendment, stupid,” Walker wrote, granting a request for a temporary restraining order. A hearing for a preliminary injunction is scheduled for later this month.

The ruling puts a temporary halt to one of DeSantis’ most brazen attempts to defeat Amendment 4, which would overturn the six-week abortion ban he signed into law.

On Oct. 3, the Florida Department of Health sent letters threatening to criminally prosecute television stations if they did not stop running an ad that features a woman named Caroline who was diagnosed with brain cancer two years ago while pregnant with her second child. In the ad, the woman says Florida’s six-week abortion ban would have prevented her from receiving a potentially life-saving abortion.

I've said it before, and I will say it again:  Today's Republican Party is not the opposition, it is the enemy, and they are a clear and present danger.

Once again, I quote what historical novelist Robert Graves put into the mouth of Germanicus Caesar, Republicans "Must be struck into the dust, struck down again as they rise. Struck again while they lie groaning, while their wounds still pain them; they will respect the hand that dealt them."

Stopped Clock Moment by a 7:2 Vote

The Supreme Court has ruled that the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau's funding is constitutional. 

The Supreme Court on Thursday rejected a challenge to the constitutionality of the structure used to fund the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, the federal agency tasked with enforcing consumer finance laws. By a vote of 7-2, the justices reversed a decision by a federal appeals court in Louisiana, which had ruled that the agency’s funding violates the Constitution because it comes from the Federal Reserve rather than through the congressional appropriations process.

Justice Clarence Thomas wrote for the majority, in a decision that relied heavily on both the text of the Constitution and early English and U.S. history.

Justice Samuel Alito dissented, in an opinion joined by Justice Neil Gorsuch. He offered a dueling interpretation of history that he suggested, leads to the conclusion that the CFPB’s funding scheme “blatantly attempts to circumvent the Constitution.”

The case was one of several on the court’s docket this term involving the division of authority between the three branches of government, as well as the power of administrative agencies. It began as a challenge by two industry groups to a “payday lending” rule that the agency issued in 2017. A three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 5th Circuit rejected their argument that the rule violated the federal laws governing administrative agencies.

I rather do think that the fact it was the Federal Reserve funding the CFPB saved it.

I do not think that stripping the CFPB of funding would have put the funding mechanism for the Federal Reserve at risk, and that would have pissed off the conservative justices financier patrons.

Federalize the F%$#ing Texas National Guard

A few days ago, the Supreme Court allowed Texas to continue to enforce its anti-immigrant law, and yesterday, the 5th Circuit issued a new injunction against the law:

A federal appeals court late Tuesday night stopped a state law allowing Texas police to arrest people suspected of illegally crossing the Texas-Mexico border — hours after the U.S. Supreme Court had allowed it to go into effect.

Earlier in the day, the high court had allowed the law to go into effect after it sent the case back to the appeals court, urging it to issue a ruling promptly. The appeals court soon scheduled a hearing for Wednesday morning. And on the night before hearing oral arguments the appeals court issued an order to let a lower court's earlier injunction stopping Senate Bill 4 stand, according to a filing.

The Supreme Court earlier Tuesday let SB 4 go into effect but stopped short of ruling on the law's constitutionality, which has been challenged by the Biden administration.

………

SB 4 seeks to make illegally crossing the border a Class B misdemeanor, carrying a punishment of up to six months in jail. Repeat offenders could face a second-degree felony with a punishment of two to 20 years in prison.

The law also requires state judges to order migrants returned to Mexico if they are convicted; local law enforcement would be responsible for transporting migrants to the border. A judge could drop the charges if a migrant agrees to return to Mexico voluntarily.

The 5th Circuit is arguably the most conservative circuit in the United States, and it just sounds like they threw some MAJOR shade at the Supreme Court.

This will not be the last time that this happens.

I Am Amused

A judge in Illinois, one appointed by Barack Obama, has ruled that the law banning illegal immigrants from owning guns is unconstitutional.

It appears to me that this is actually in accordance with Supreme Court precedent, though I am pretty sure that the Neanderthal majority on the did not foresee this: 

A judge this month dropped gun charges against an illegal migrant in Illinois, sparking further debate about the rights associated with the Second Amendment.

U.S. District Court Judge Sharon Coleman of the Northern District of Illinois referenced lower court rulings in dismissing firearm possession charges against Heriberto Carbajal-Flores, who was illegally or unlawfully in the United States when he possessed a handgun in the Little Village neighborhood of Chicago on June 1, 2020.

"The Court finds that Carbajal-Flores' criminal record, containing no improper use of a weapon, as well as the non-violent circumstances of his arrest do not support a finding that he poses a risk to public safety such that he cannot be trusted to use a weapon responsibly and should be deprived of his Second Amendment right to bear arms in self-defense," Coleman, who was appointed under President Barack Obama, wrote in her eight-page ruling filed March 8.

………

The court previously denied two motions by Carbajal-Flores to dismiss charges. The first time was on April 13, 2022, and the second on December 19, 2022—about six months after the U.S. Supreme Court voted 6-3 to strike down a 100-year-old New York law requiring that individuals show "proper cause" to get a license to carry a firearm outside a home, stemming from the 2022 ruling in New York State Rifle & Pistol Association, Inc. et al v. Bruen, Superintendent of New York State Police, et al. 

The irony here is delicious.

2 and Counting

Still not comfortable with the precedent, but I will enjoy the conservative butt-hurt that is soon to follow Maine secretary of state's decision to bar Donald Trump from the Presidential primary ballot.

Pass the popcorn:

Secretary of State Shenna Bellows, in Augusta last January, acknowledged in her ruling Thursday that no secretary of state has ever deprived a presidential candidate of ballot access based on Section 3 of the 14th Amendment.

Secretary of State Shenna Bellows issued a ruling Thursday night barring former President Donald Trump from appearing on Maine’s March 5, 2024, presidential primary ballot.

Bellows, a Democrat, became the first state election official to conclude that Trump’s primary petition is invalid, ruling that he is not qualified to hold the office of the president under Section 3 of the 14th Amendment. Trump’s campaign say it will challenge her ruling in state court.

Her decision makes Maine just the second state in the country to bar Trump from the ballot. Earlier this month, the Colorado Supreme Court booted Trump from the ballot under the same Civil War-era provision of the Constitution.

“I conclude … that the record establishes that Mr. Trump, over the course of several months and culminating on January 6, 2021, used a false narrative of election fraud to inflame his supporters and direct them to the Capitol to prevent certification of the 2020 election and the peaceful transfer of power,” Bellows said in the statement she issued Thursday night. “I likewise conclude that Mr. Trump was aware of the likelihood for violence and at least initially supported its use given he both encouraged it with incendiary rhetoric and took no timely action to stop it.

Much like the case in Colorado, I don't expect this to stand.

The Supreme Court, which has bent over backwards to defend Republican electoral manipulation (Bush v. Gore) will leave skid marks in their haste to overturn their prior precedents.

Still, until this happens, I will enjoy seeing the 'Phants trolled.

Mixed Emotions on This

The Colorado Supreme Court has excluded Donald Trump from the primary ballot on the basis of the 14th Amendment insurrection clause.

The MAGAt butt-hurt over this is exquisite.  I will use their tears to season my soup for decades to come.

On the other hand, Trump has not yet actually been convicted of a crime related to insurrection, (Yet) and the potential for abuse of this ruling, and I shudder at the prospect of someone like delusional U.S. District Court Judge Matthew Kacsmaryk having similar authority.

I do think that this complicates matters for the right-wing hacks on the Supreme Court though, because they now have to rule on both the Colorado case, while ruling in an expedited manner on Special Prosecutor Jack Smith's challenge to Donald Trump's claims of complete immunity for everything forever.

It jams up the Supreme Court 's conservatives something fierce which is an unalloyed good.

Colorado’s top court ruled on Tuesday that former President Donald J. Trump is disqualified from holding office again because he engaged in insurrection with his actions leading up to the Jan. 6 storming of the Capitol, an explosive ruling that is likely to put the basic contours of the 2024 election in the hands of the U.S. Supreme Court.

The Colorado Supreme Court was the first in the nation to find that Section 3 of the 14th Amendment — which disqualifies people who engage in insurrection against the Constitution after taking an oath to support it — applies to Mr. Trump, an argument that his opponents have been making around the country.

The ruling directs the Colorado secretary of state to exclude Mr. Trump’s name from the state’s Republican primary ballot. It does not address the general election.

“We do not reach these conclusions lightly,” a four-justice majority wrote, with three justices dissenting. “We are mindful of the magnitude and weight of the questions now before us. We are likewise mindful of our solemn duty to apply the law, without fear or favor, and without being swayed by public reaction to the decisions that the law mandates we reach.”

Mr. Trump’s campaign said immediately that it would appeal the decision to the U.S. Supreme Court. The Colorado justices anticipated that likelihood by putting their ruling on hold at least until Jan. 4; if Mr. Trump appeals before then, the hold will continue until the Supreme Court rules. And while Tuesday’s ruling applies only to one state, it could all but force the nation’s highest court to decide the question for all 50.

I do not think that there is any way that the Supreme Court can not rule on this and retain any credibility, and, absent a conviction for insurrectionist acts, I think that it is EXTREMELY likely that they will overturn the Colorado Supreme Court decision.

But if they do, and then they write Trump a get out of jail free card for the insurrection investigation, I think that we will start seeing a significant portion of the populace invoking Andrew Jackson's, "John Marshall has made his decision, now let him enforce it."

This is not a good thing.  Andrew Jackson was doing this in service of ethnic cleansing, but we are definitely getting to that poing.