The All Things Political Topic - A conservative is someone who makes no changes and consults his grandmother when in doubt

[Pidesco]

1 hour ago, Malcador said:

Some of these judges are pricks when questioning.  Alito particularly

It's being streamed somewhere?

[Malcador]

22 minutes ago, Pidesco said:

It's being streamed somewhere?

Yah, was on PBS at least.

 

 

 

I listened in and out, interesting how the court flows.

[Gromnir]

13 minutes ago, Pidesco said:

It's being streamed somewhere?

Live Oral Argument Audio (supremecourt.gov)

am gonna go out on a limb and suggest @Malcadorwould not have enjoyed law school.

the Justices, even the ones who were not professors before joining the bench, all came out o' a law school tradition which has changed little in a couple hundred years. prof asks questions. student provides answers. SCOTUS which only addresses the questions o' law, is more like law school than any other court in the US. 

'course all the Justices is unique. RBG were notorious for her acerbic questions.... makes alito look positive pleasant by comparison. clarence thomas, for years, never asked any questions. literal... and not how kids use "literal" nowadays. point is there is gonna be fails when generalizing. 

regardless, all the Justices is arrogant and none o' them were elected. would be shocking if a few didn't come across as unpleasant.

HA! Good Fun!

[Zoraptor]

The special counsel's report into Biden's retention of classified information is... interesting.

"At trial, Mr. Biden would likely present himself to a jury, as he did during our interview of him, as a sympathetic, well-meaning, elderly man with a poor memory [..]

It would be difficult to convince a jury that they should convict him [..] of a serious felony that requires a mental state of willfulness"*

Poor memory included not remembering when he was VP, nor the year his son died- so not exactly the trivial minutiae of a life spent in office. Way better for Biden in many ways than Trump's conduct was for him but still, a choice between a crook and a dotard is not exactly a brilliant one.

*should be noted, also not enough evidence to charge apart from having to prove willfulness, which sounds far better.

[Hurlshort]

For me, the choice is less about the crook or the dotard, and more about who they surround themselves with. Biden's team is fairly quiet, while Trump's team is brash, and they all leave after 9 months to get rich writing a memoir.  

[Gromnir]

5 hours ago, Zoraptor said:

*should be noted, also not enough evidence to charge apart from having to prove willfulness, which sounds far better.

grammar problem detected. even so, if you are trying to say the special counsel concluded it would be difficult to prove willful retention o' documents, we agree and such an observation is deserving more than an asterisk. 

is doubtful anybody wants to go back through our hillary posts. 

hillary also presented mind-blowing doofus levels when interviewed... which the republicans ignored as they pushed for criminal charges. shoulda' focused on her abject stoopid as 'posed to criminal liability? yeah.

"In looking back at our investigations into mishandling or removal of classified information, we cannot find a case that would support bringing criminal charges on these facts. All the cases prosecuted involved some combination of: clearly intentional and willful mishandling of classified information; or vast quantities of materials exposed in such a way as to support an inference of intentional misconduct; or indications of disloyalty to the United States; or efforts to obstruct justice." -- comey from the original hillary investigation.

you lose your security clearance and get fired if you are not an elected official and do what hillary, alberto gonzalez, biden and possible pence all did. however, has literal never been a prosecution w/o more than one o' the following:

1) willful retention and mishandling

2) large quantities o' info

3) disloyalty to the US as a motivation for having the info

4) obstruction

edit: so is clear, am not making excuse for biden anymore than we did for hillary. hur says there is evidence to show biden willful retained but that convincing jurors o' willfulness would be difficult in part 'cause biden is old and confused.... and 'cause none o' the other enumerated factors is present. so not good. have said many times we believe biden is a terrible candidate. in 2020, biden was a compromise candidate. he did not expire or need be replaced w/i six months o' taking office as at least one obsidian pundit suggested were part o' the libs plan going forward, but just 'cause he managed to make it to february 2024, is not some kinda argument for reelecting him.  

compared to trump? sure, to keep trump out o' the oval office we would vote for biden, but such is an extremely low bar to hurdle. 

regardless, is so stoopid that 'cause both trump and biden had a documents issue, neither party is willing to do the obvious and make a real and concerted effort to fix the core problem o' misplaced national freaking secrets. hillary should never have had classified info (albeit far less than some describe) on a private server, and trump, pence, biden and gonzalez should never have been able to retain documents w/o anybody seeimng aware there were a problem until some intervening incident occurred. for chrissakes, the kinda info described should have more safeguards than checking out books from a local library. how can this sh!te go missing w/o somebody knowing?

HA! Good Fun!

 

Edited February 9 by Gromnir

[Malcador]

5 hours ago, Gromnir said:

am gonna go out on a limb and suggest @Malcadorwould not have enjoyed law school.

Can't be that bad.  Engineering had sociopathic indifference from the staff or at least in one funny instance, one prof that'd tell us we were subhuman scum unworthy of life much less being able to work with magnetism.

[Gromnir]

1 hour ago, Malcador said:

Can't be that bad.  Engineering had sociopathic indifference from the staff or at least in one funny instance, one prof that'd tell us we were subhuman scum unworthy of life much less being able to work with magnetism.

grass is always greener we s'pose. our first undergrad degree is physics from berkeley and one summer internship we had was working at lawrence livermore materials lab, so we had a bit o' interaction with the engineers. we did nothing but test the tensile strength o' tungsten wire... for months. meh.

in our day, which admitted were likely a bit before your day, sociopathic indifference for stem were kinda the norm and our reaction were... indifference. professors showing for class or office hours were quite obvious a waste o' their limited time and collectively they did not hide their displeasure. however, our goal were to graduate as quick as possible and so we saw our professors as minor obstacles. undergrad indifference were no biggie, but is one reason we did not go for masters or beyond with stem.

...

none o' which is relevant to the thread, so we will note how dartmouth has gone back to requiring sat scores after ending their experiment with voluntary test score submissions. such is incredible loose related since is education? one reason offered by dartmouth for the change was that the lack o' test scores were disproportionate disadvantaging minority students and students from depressed communities. everybody going to dartmouth, or near everybody, has a 4.0 and a long list o' extra curriculars. wealthy zip codes in the US has noteworthy more grade inflation.

HA! Good Fun!

ps the kingsfield character from paper chase is an amalgam o' three or four harvard law professors. is a story about rl "kingsfield." numerous folks has confirmed the legitimacy o' the annecdote, but...

duck hunting. a couple law students is out duck hunting and as improbable as it sounds, one o' the young men were a bit o' an annie oakley, so he were using a pistol to kill birds. no joke. kingsley motors up alongside the student's craft and asks if they had managed to kill so many birds with a pistol. annie oakley assures the professor that he had indeed used a pistol.

kingsley pulls out his shotgun and blows a hole in the student's boat, then leaves.

the law students manage to get back to shore where they pay for the damage to the boat as it were rented.

end o' story.

we got loads o' weird but inane professor stories (one grad school prof did not wear pants when he were in his office... thankfully he did retain his underwear. he were on the pulitzer committee and had an international rep, so who were gonna tell him what to do, eh?) and am aware o' a few professor-doing-murder tales, but am admitting the kingsley anecdote is unique.

pps given the nature o' this board, am gonna observe am aware annie oakley were famous for her accuracy with rifles and shotguns as 'posed to pistols.

 

Edited February 9 by Gromnir

[Malcador]

Biden saying Israel's response is over the top is going to make Bibi happy.   Also confused Mexico and Egypt which is admittedly funny, I am sure some are going to indicate that is senility (and ignore Trump since..what 8 years ago?)

Edited February 9 by Malcador

[Gromnir]

2 hours ago, Malcador said:

Also confused Mexico and Egypt which is admittedly funny, I am sure some are going to indicate that is senility (and ignore Trump since..what 8 years ago?)

we wouldn't trust either of 'em around a gas stove and is no way we would let 'em drive in chicaco/boston/nyc rush hour traffic if we were a passenger... 'cause they are both old and have shown cognitive impairment. why then would we be ok with 'em being President? similar, with the bat-crap crazy rfk jr routine indulges, is not as if we trust him more than trump or biden.

biden is old, but he isn't indulging crazy conspiracy nutter indifference to facts and he ain't a would-be autocrat who believes a President is free to commit crimes in office... oh, and no "muslim ban," from biden. am not paralyzed by the need to make a lesser evil choice. life is full o' such hard choices, so just like the last few election cycles, we put on our big boy pants and go to the polls... or we would if CA didn't have ballots sent auto via the mail based on cadl data. so much more convenient.

edit: am thinking what surprises us most about the biden mishandling docs report from today is that all the stuff james comey got in trouble for regarding the hillary email investigation were replicated by hur. robert hur, unlike what you saw from robert mueller who were taciturn to a fault, had all kinda opinions about 2023 joe biden. am getting the need for transparency, but the doj needs to change policy and explain why the change is being implemented if this kinda thing is the new norm... and am thinking comey deserves a belated apology.

HA! Good Fun!

Edited February 9 by Gromnir

[Gromnir]

as a rule of thumb, most pretrial judicial decisions is beyond the scope o' a demand for recusal, so am not knowing how far goes an attempt to remove cannon w/o a showing o' gross and intentional dereliction o' judicial duties. however, am also admitting we got extreme limited rl experience with sepa cases-- have learned more from the lawfare site and other sources in the last few months than we knew in previous decades o' practice. am not claiming expertise. 

reminds us. we keep making a mental distinction 'tween classified/sensitive documents and transmissions while ignoring practical aspects and legal reality. listening to biden defend self in his presser highlighted for us one such blind spot. biden seeming didn't see his notes/personal notebook as sensitive info for purposes o' possible criminal liability. hillary, based on the ig report done after comey's blunders, also had a curious issue with recognizing just what constituted sensitive info. emails sent to then secretary of state clinton which didn't have the "C" tag indicating classification could nevertheless be classified docs for purposes o' law if those emails even tangential referenced classified info. in an earlier post we marveled at how sooper secret docs could possible go missing w/o anybody noticing, but we did (and do) forget to mention how secrets may breed.

the outline o' plans for invading iran trump supposed showed off to biographers o' the mark meadows book is clearly state secret material. the thing is, if trump quoted a portion o' the plan in a handwritten note to bob woodward, the handwritten note would be state secret material... and if somebody on trump's staff quoted the handwritten note and transmitted via an email, that too would be state secret and the mishandling and transmission o' such would be exposing individuals to criminal liability. as such our flippant characterization o' national secret security protocols in the context o' library books being checked out is falling far short o' capturing the real scope o' the problem. 

am mentioning the replicating aspect o' sensitive info data 'cause listening to biden reminded us o' hillary-- both o' those individuals were curious oblivious to the fact a classified or sensitive "document" label applied to more than documents clear marked with a big "C" or contained in a red-boarder folder. hillary, for all her faults, was not accused o' being cognitive impaired. she didn't have a personal computer or laptop and was spectacularly unsophisticated regarding technical matters, but she was not dumb. even so, she clear didn't get that rando emails sent to her from staff and white house personnel could be dangerously sensitive state secret material which had no place on her personal and unsecured home server. numerous fbi investigators interviewed hillary and they were sometimes baffled by her failure to grasp basic technical issues related to security. disconnect were too consistent and bizarre to be anything but genuine. likewise, biden still don't seem to understand that his personal notebook which included info regarding afghanistan operations were nevertheless classified info for purposes o' law. reports suggest pence also had sensitive materials at his personal residence, but am suspecting is many more individuals who made similar errors we will never know 'bout.

jack smith in his case against tump ain't dealing with any ambiguities. subject matter o' the mar-a-lago case is not cc email chain material or one o' those post-its or napkins trump reported flushed down the toilet. even so am thinking there needs be a serious reexamination o' how sensitive materials is tracked and recovered, while recognizing there is limits to just how invasive tracking efforts may be given that in the US we got civilian and elected leaders, as well as their staff, routine handling the most secret o' secrets.

HA! Good Fun!

 

Edited February 9 by Gromnir

[Gorth]

You can't make this stuff up...

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-68266447

"Donald Trump has said he would "encourage" Russia to attack any Nato member that fails to pay its bills as part of the Western military alliance.

At a rally on Saturday, he said he had once told a leader he would not protect a nation behind on its payments, and would "encourage" the aggressors to "do whatever the hell they want"."

[uuuhhii]

so it has turn into protection fee racket

look like eu replace nato is inevitable

[Gromnir]

5 hours ago, Gorth said:

You can't make this stuff up...

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-68266447

"Donald Trump has said he would "encourage" Russia to attack any Nato member that fails to pay its bills as part of the Western military alliance.

At a rally on Saturday, he said he had once told a leader he would not protect a nation behind on its payments, and would "encourage" the aggressors to "do whatever the hell they want"."

through the looking glass.

s'posed a bastion o' conservative american news, this story is not a headline at the main fox news site. try and imagine imagine if obama had said the same thing. what would fox news look and sound like the day after such a story broke?

2024 tucker carlson fans don't get @Gorth surprise. 

in fact,

before 2018, tell us a significant % o' republicans would shrug off the nato comments you quote coming from the likely gop candidate for President and we would think you were chemical impaired. 

HA! Good Fun!

[BruceVC]

18 hours ago, Gorth said:

You can't make this stuff up...

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-68266447

"Donald Trump has said he would "encourage" Russia to attack any Nato member that fails to pay its bills as part of the Western military alliance.

At a rally on Saturday, he said he had once told a leader he would not protect a nation behind on its payments, and would "encourage" the aggressors to "do whatever the hell they want"."

Gorthfuscious,  come on 

How  many years have  we been  debating Trumps  grandstanding  and populist rhetoric?

When Trump is at  a rally you cant take anything he says seriously, Im honestly surprised  anyone is still  "shocked  "   but what Trump says.  These  types  of statements are expected  Trump 101  rally theater  and political hyperbole 

 

[HoonDing]

Yeah, just like when he mocked the disabled and bragged about grabbing Ivanka by the ****

5D chess

[Gromnir]

4 hours ago, HoonDing said:

Yeah, just like when he mocked the disabled and bragged about grabbing Ivanka by the ****

5D chess

is not even tic-tac-toe. trump just says what he thinks his base wants to hear, and sometimes he says stuff 'cause he assumes his base wants to hear same as himself. the thing is, even when trump goes too far even for his base, they will make excuses... says he is joking or that unlike a politician, trump talks like a real person.

back in summer 2020 multiple obsidian boardies laughed off trump suggestions he would contest the election if it didn't go his way... and it weren't just trumpers or conservatives trying to suggest trump weren't being serious or somesuch. one poster suggested the media were to blame for fear mongering by giving credence to trump claims... that didn't age well, did it? another poster laughed off the potential threat 'cause even trump had to know he couldn't get away with refusing to leave office.

...

at the time we marveled how after three years o' trump, people continued to pretend as if impossible or abject stoopid were obstacles to trump doing. we even predicted the eventual legal mechanism which would be exploited by team trump.

jan 6. build the wall. send fed troops to portland. muslim ban. etc. not just one-offs.

nevertheless, here we are in 2024 and people continue to pretend as if impossibility and too-stoopid-to-be-real is meaningful hurdles for trump. only the Courts and Congress may limit trump 'cause the trump base is all-in and the rest o' the gop believes it needs the trump base. Court integrity has sadly been hit and miss but they has refused to embrace the most extreme trump efforts such as trying to steal the election (so far) and his attempted muslim ban. on the other hand, Congress is so divided and partisan that unless democrats managed 2/3 in the senate, am not certain trump could be convicted o' any crime or wrong no matter how vile.

am no longer genuine surprised that so many liberals shrug at trump excesses. just another social media post, speech, sound bite, declaration o' unconstitutional, etc. ho-hum.

am no longer surprised when s'posed conservatives make improbable excuses for trump

...

US tribalism to a degree we never woulda' predicted during peacetime.

HA! Good Fun!

ps worth reading the following 'cause in spite o' fact we noted earlier that the recent special counsel report found there were not enough evidence to prove willful retention by biden insofar as documents, we keep seeing media sources reporting much different.

https://twitter.com/rgoodlaw/status/1756725689724620921

Edited February 12 by Gromnir

[Gfted1]

Putin critic Alexei Navalny, 47, dies in Arctic Circle jail (bbc.com)

[HoonDing]

Heh. The posturing in western media is going to be insufferable.

[Zoraptor]

I'd be interested in Navalny's reasons for returning to Russia. It always seemed like a dumb decision similar to Iraqi generals Hussein and Kamal al Majid who defected from and then returned to Iraq under Saddam- and they at least got a promise of immunity (not kept, of course).

He surely can't have thought there'd be a popular uprising to install him as President or something and he was nowhere near important enough to earn protected status.

[Sarex]

2 minutes ago, Zoraptor said:

He surely can't have thought there'd be a popular uprising to install him as President or something and he was nowhere near important enough to earn protected status.

Probably got the same promise as Ukraine. Something along the line of "Yeah man, go for it, we are right behind you"...

[Hurlshort]

1 hour ago, HoonDing said:

Heh. The posturing in western media is going to be insufferable.

As chaotic and crazy as western politics get, it's still preferable to a system where political opponents are imprisoned and murdered.

[Sarex]

6 minutes ago, Hurlshort said:

As chaotic and crazy as western politics get, it's still preferable to a system where political opponents are imprisoned and murdered.

Kennedy? Trump?

[Malcador]

1 hour ago, HoonDing said:

Heh. The posturing in western media is going to be insufferable.

Maybe we'll have a state funeral for him

[Lexx]

25 minutes ago, Sarex said:

Kennedy? Trump?

Of all the possible people you want to bring out Trump as example???