I think we'll end up looking back on yesterday's ruling and calling it "Kavanaugh's Gun." Because just like Chekov's gun, it's there on the mantle and it WILL be used before this play reaches the final act.
Fascists love laws that have room for interpretation. Encourages bribery, lets personal initiative run wild, makes enforcement so much more efficient. Every loyal man his own private court.
So many lawyers I respect – online and in three dimensions – have been calling yesterday’s decision the death of the Republic, I needed a laugh. And “We didn’t give that asshole everything he wanted because habeus corpus sim sala bim, boopty do!” gave me that laugh. So thanks, Roy.
Jesus, what a week. Feel free to insert your own versions of “Lemon, it’s Tuesday.”
The people who worship the law are finally forced to realize that their god is dead. They’ve been clinging desperately to hope since Bush v Gore, when it’s been obvious to the rest of us.
I get what you're saying, but while Bush v. Gore was bad -- it highlighted how the political leanings of the Court influenced them to put their thumbs on the scale -- I think yesterday was worse. "The President is a king" strikes me as crossing a new Rubicon that we can't easily paddle back across.
Of course yesterday was worse, but a judicial coup—the Republican “justices” overturning an election to install their guy, who appointed their replacements—wasn’t a minor thing. It was a judicial coup, and out of shock or denial most people minimized it and “moved on.”
I don't disagree. One interesting point I saw raised that I wholeheartedly believe is true: when the conservative justices hand down these rulings, they do so because they are confident only Republican presidents will utilize their rulings to abuse power. I saw a lot of joking yesterday to the effect Biden should take the Court at face value and say "Bet. Take Trump into custody and clap him in irons!" But we all know that isn't going to happen.
Yup. They know exactly how this would play out. Dems insist they’re still playing softball while Repubs have ditched the game and are flat-out bludgeoning people with their bats. “Surely the celestial referees will step in and correct this!” mewl our leaders from fetal position, just before losing consciousness.
And the most insidious thing is Congress has no ability to reverse the Court's decision, even supposing Congress wasn't controlled by the GOP or that the Democrats had spines. The country is now effectively run by Roberts, Alito, Thomas, Kavanaugh, and Barrett. I give AOC credit for saying she will file impeachment articles, but it's a gesture that will go nowhere.
And I trust we all know that that not happening is a good thing. Biden won’t take up these powers for the same reason that Gandalf refused the ring. It’s just another path to dictatorship. And before anyone pipes up that they’d take King Joe over King Donald, so would I. But things would not always remain so, alas.
Yup, law's not gonna save us. The only thing that has worked - only thing that will ever work - is 80 million people voting for Joe Biden. In other words, we're probably fucked.
Nicely done. I can't wait till you write the scene where his heart explodes and instead of helping him, his familiars go through his pockets and take pictures of his final moments.
These need a Goblin style soundtrack like Argento used for Susperia- a near subaudible buzz that provides a suitable skin crawl.
This turned up in a Google search. I know I've used it before, maybe not here. I probably attributed it to O'Hara. So what if it's really a Maugham tell. The original was probably written in cuneiform. Anyway, what a great story.
I swear I'm going to live to see him keep his appointment.
The Appointment in Samarra"
(as retold by W. Somerset Maugham [1933])
The speaker is Death
There was a merchant in Bagdad who sent his servant to market to buy provisions and in a little while the servant came back, white and trembling, and said, Master, just now when I was in the marketplace I was jostled by a woman in the crowd and when I turned I saw it was Death that jostled me. She looked at me and made a threatening gesture, now, lend me your horse, and I will ride away from this city and avoid my fate. I will go to Samarra and there Death will not find me. The merchant lent him his horse, and the servant mounted it, and he dug his spurs in its flanks and as fast as the horse could gallop he went. Then the merchant went down to the marketplace and he saw me standing in the crowd and he came to me and said, Why did you make a threating getsture to my servant when you saw him this morning? That was not a threatening gesture, I said, it was only a start of surprise. I was astonished to see him in Bagdad, for I had an appointment with him tonight in Samarra.
"a near subaudible buzz that provides a suitable skin crawl"
Reminds me of the moment in Orpheu Negro when the samba abruptly stops as Death chases Euridice into the streetcar barn and suddenly the angry bee sound of the transformers is everywhere. Bad things, man...
I wish that Biden would use his newly acquired presidential immunity to order Trump, his family, and anyone who supports him to be permanently expelled from the United States of America.
The events of the world overwhelm me: and my own life needs attention: I'm offline until Friday or maybe Monday. I read everything eventually..
Roy I'd like you to do the Sedition Six as necromancers: raising Madison, Hamilton, etc. to have them consider issues they never imagined and couldn't imagine, to be puppets for the Federalist Society...
Something like this is the Final Episode of Checkmate Lincolnites. Except it's a Nazi raising the Confederate leadership and then fighting against Union re-enactors
This corrupt, illegitimate court is drunk with power and worse than the Taney court. Almost worse than the Marbury vs Madison court, who gifted us this abomination in the first place with their power grab.
Still waiting for the NYT to finish up its endless cycle of “Dems in disarray over debate” stories and discover the American Republic was murdered yesterday and its body dumped in an alley off Pennsylvania Avenue. The Biden Crime Family now has the go-ahead to arrest every perjured and corrupt Justice and replace them with judges who can read English. Gotta replace Garland first, of course. Alvin Bragg comes to mind.
"If he's so infirm he needs to resign, then he should resign and we'd have to live with it, but if you think he's fine for presidenting from now to January, just not for campaigning, then you're thinking it for the wrong reasons: not that he's unfit for office, but that Somebody Else wrongly thinks he is. This is a case, finally, where we should do what Republicans would do, as long as we can: double down."
Just further evidence that we're living in a computer simulation or the like. As for a counter-argument, I read an article the other day about how art explained the world much better than facts that used climate change as an example and cited five instances from Shakespeare that explained humanity's inability to do anything about it. Very good, I thought, but is there anything in art that explains how everything we were taught, and beyond that, everything the most cynical thought we understood, turned out to be ridiculously naive when it came to how fast American democracy could devolve into a monkey house?
Speaking of the simulation: There's that great moment at the climax of the first Matrix, when Neo realizes everything. It cuts to his p.o.v., and he sees that the agents, and the hallway they're in, are just a cascade of code. They hold that for two seconds, tops, and it's thrilling.
I keep waiting to experience a similar moment, but so far it hasn't come.
I do think our art ill-prepared us for this moment, because since 1945 it has rendered Nazis as methodical, pure evil. We all feel sure we would recognize that -- it wears a black uniform! We can beat it with Heroism! We would have been better served by movies depicting the gradual undermining of shared institutions by circus-freak rightwing liars reacting to social liberalization with cries of fear that our Way of Life is Under Attack. I mean really it was in 1932 a very similar straight line from drag queen story hour to the reichstag fire. But in art -- and in public school, and in endless cable documentaries -- we are taught it had more to do with inflation + Hitler than with how 20% of the population are fragile bedwetting morons with "conservative" [authoritarian] instincts getting worked up by a handful of sociopathic, power-mad morons telling them it's okay to burn down all of civilization because then there will be only Traditional White People Forever.
Right now there's probably a lot of people in France having their "It can't happen here" moment, just like many of us did in 2016. At least I'm past that shit. What does it say about America that someone like Donald Trump could not only get elected once, but twice? It says we're a normal country, afflicted with the same problem every normal country has: An anxious middle class that's more desirous of order* than justice, who never really took all this "freedom" and "democracy" shit seriously, willing to throw it all over if it causes the slightest inconvenience to them.
You say 20%, I'd say about a third, and when only about half the population votes, that'll do it.
*You might think it strange that anyone would see Agent of Chaos Donald Trump as a source of "order", but the word here needs to be understood as "the natural order" where they are on top and everyone else knows their place.
(France has already had one Vichy and Le Pen is *not* about to institute another one, so there's that. Also, like a certain former President, she's on Putin's payroll and has been for years.)
It is shocking to see your fellow countrymen show up in hate of you and the country. That's the thing we are going to have to contend with in 2028 no matter what happens this year. The shockingly high percent of our population (I think actual science puts it at 28%) with the authoritarian personality -- that is, Americans who actually do not want democracy or rule of law -- who have been supercharged since 2016.
Related: On Twitter the past 24 hours there's been the saga of a woman who tweeted how her one-year-old loves peaches, so her wonderful husband went to the store to buy a peach. Hundreds of angry parents descended to reply "You are spoiling your child! You must say NO!" You might expect "provider provides, wife/mother charmed" would align with their kinder-kuche trad shtick, but the woman also had "MD" next to her name and I wonder if that had anything to do with how they lost their marbles. Anyway my thought was "This is why we can't have nice things. All these angry people from stern, broken families who don't realize it. All these people who would take more joy in saying NO than in finding a peach for a one-year-old girl who loves peaches. All these people who think law & order means authority figures living their lives selfishly without trying to make life decent for anyone else."
I wonder if the ruling could help Biden in cases where he acts legally. As usual, the Right will claim that what he does is illegal; now, however, all they'll be able to claim is that Biden's action falls into the newly-minted teacup of unofficial acts. What MAGA says is wrong and/or illegal won't matter any more to domestic and world opinion than it already does. So be very bold, but keep it defensible, or at least plausible?
MAGA thinks everyone who isn't MAGA is "wrong and/or illegal"; they're not going to take away the powers of the current President, or his or my right to exist, by (pre) judicial fiat.
"Merrick, what do you think about what the former president says?"
"Sir, I think his words are in opposition to our democratic order, and put our nation in peril."
"Alright, Merrick – would you say they present a genuine threat?"
"Why, yes, yes Sir, I think they do."
"Mr Attorney General, I hereby direct you, as part of my official duties, to take whatever steps are necessary, up to and including, for instance, physical gags, removing all access to media, breaking his thumbs so he cannot text, and prohibiting all other persons to have any contact of any sort whatsoever with the Clear and Present Danger to our nation."
"Deb, in your considered opinion, do we have enough protected lands here in the United States?"
"Ah, Mr President, thank you for asking. As you suggested some while ago, I've been going over the maps, and conclude that there's roughly 3 million square miles all told in the 50 states, and about 1 million are already in public ownership of one sort or another. So my estimate is we should add some more to the public lands – say, 2 million square miles or so."
"Madame Secretary, please pull that together in one package for national monument designation, and have it on my desk tomorrow."
[Several Cabinet Secretaries crowding around outside the door of the Oval Office, all calling out at once]
"Mr President? Mr President?"
"Hold on, hold on alla yins – you'll get your turns. But do not come in here unless your ideas are bigger than anyone ever imagined. Have I made myself clear?"
"Oh, oh. This place here in Florida, this just got declared protected Federal land, no construction allowed. Well! As an official act I'm going to have to act to keep this land cleared."
"Got it, Mr. President. The drones are on the way to Mar-a-Largo as we speak."
Help me out here: The President calls up his Attorney General and threatens to fire him if he doesn't launch an immediate investigation into vote fraud based on claims they both know are lies. It's an official act, see, because obviously the President has a right to hire and fire Attorneys General? The fact that it's in furtherance of a much larger corrupt scheme to defraud the United States, installing the guy who lost in the White House, we'll just pretend not to see that. Just take each act individually (the President called the Georgia Secretary of State and demanded 11,000 more votes? Well, doesn't a President, from time to time, use a telephone in the course of his official duties?) and refuse to see the conspiracy they're a part of.
It's like their ruling on bribery - er, excuse me, gratuities - someone gives a politician a little gift after an official decision comes down, who can say it was a bribe? We just see a little money changing hands, who knows what it's for? Not us, who are we to judge?
Biden should introduce a bill to replace the entire Supreme Court with those three monkeys. On second thought, just two monkeys, "Speak no evil" won't be needed, thanks.
You know how they sometimes have those bill-signing ceremonies, where a Governor or President will use a succession of different pens to form their signature, handing each pen off to someone involved in the creation of the bill? Suppose we had a similar ceremony, where as each letter of his name is formed, a bagful of cash drops from the ceiling.
"Mr President of the Universe? Can I have a word wi-"
"Not now and maybe not ever. What did we talk about? You see the sign?"
"Oh, yeah – sorry Your Royal Dudeness" [hands over sacks of cash]
"Now that we've got the before/after thing outta the way (and why the 'final R-biters' did that one before the Big Finale I do not understand), and understanding that everything I say is official duty, just be certain to bring the tribute up front, OK? Everything I do is official, everything I say is official, everything I think is official. Got it? Now get outta here before I take all your oil wells and your hot wife by eminent domain!"
Sure, and maybe the waiter provides better service in anticipation that it might get them a bigger tip, nothing wrong with that, right? Just like if a politician... oh, wait, this analogy isn't working so good.
SCOTUS made bribery legal in 2016 with a unanimous ruling in McDonnell vs. United States. Roberts' majority opinion stated "the meaning of "official act" does not include merely setting up a meeting, calling another public official, or hosting an event."
So, the Georgia trial may still be OK, or else all the corrupt doofuses that had their convictions vacated by McDonnell should go back to jail
Once upon a time, kids, unions used to have actual goddamn commercials on the electric teevee. Undoubtedly yet another thing we can thank the rotting corpse of R.W. Reagan for, the shit.
I think we'll end up looking back on yesterday's ruling and calling it "Kavanaugh's Gun." Because just like Chekov's gun, it's there on the mantle and it WILL be used before this play reaches the final act.
That’s basically it. The “wiggle room” is so they can still make up something to prosecute Biden for.
Fascists love laws that have room for interpretation. Encourages bribery, lets personal initiative run wild, makes enforcement so much more efficient. Every loyal man his own private court.
And Viola! The World's Best Founding Document provides!
This is what they have always meant by “law and order.” They hate law; it’s order they want.
*conditional* law
Don't forget the opposite side of the equation -- scaring the shit out of people. What will happen if *I* seek or perform this abortion? etc. etc.
Yeah, that's the other thing. Why bother making threats when you can just rely on good ol' paranoia?
So many lawyers I respect – online and in three dimensions – have been calling yesterday’s decision the death of the Republic, I needed a laugh. And “We didn’t give that asshole everything he wanted because habeus corpus sim sala bim, boopty do!” gave me that laugh. So thanks, Roy.
Jesus, what a week. Feel free to insert your own versions of “Lemon, it’s Tuesday.”
The people who worship the law are finally forced to realize that their god is dead. They’ve been clinging desperately to hope since Bush v Gore, when it’s been obvious to the rest of us.
I get what you're saying, but while Bush v. Gore was bad -- it highlighted how the political leanings of the Court influenced them to put their thumbs on the scale -- I think yesterday was worse. "The President is a king" strikes me as crossing a new Rubicon that we can't easily paddle back across.
Of course yesterday was worse, but a judicial coup—the Republican “justices” overturning an election to install their guy, who appointed their replacements—wasn’t a minor thing. It was a judicial coup, and out of shock or denial most people minimized it and “moved on.”
I don't disagree. One interesting point I saw raised that I wholeheartedly believe is true: when the conservative justices hand down these rulings, they do so because they are confident only Republican presidents will utilize their rulings to abuse power. I saw a lot of joking yesterday to the effect Biden should take the Court at face value and say "Bet. Take Trump into custody and clap him in irons!" But we all know that isn't going to happen.
Yup. They know exactly how this would play out. Dems insist they’re still playing softball while Repubs have ditched the game and are flat-out bludgeoning people with their bats. “Surely the celestial referees will step in and correct this!” mewl our leaders from fetal position, just before losing consciousness.
And the most insidious thing is Congress has no ability to reverse the Court's decision, even supposing Congress wasn't controlled by the GOP or that the Democrats had spines. The country is now effectively run by Roberts, Alito, Thomas, Kavanaugh, and Barrett. I give AOC credit for saying she will file impeachment articles, but it's a gesture that will go nowhere.
And I trust we all know that that not happening is a good thing. Biden won’t take up these powers for the same reason that Gandalf refused the ring. It’s just another path to dictatorship. And before anyone pipes up that they’d take King Joe over King Donald, so would I. But things would not always remain so, alas.
We*. Shall**. See***.
*Some of us
**Luckily or unluckily
***From a distance or much too closely
Yup, law's not gonna save us. The only thing that has worked - only thing that will ever work - is 80 million people voting for Joe Biden. In other words, we're probably fucked.
[weak, sepulchral mumbling] “Come on, man!”
I liked "it's even got Latin in it!". The inverse of the lyrics from Thomas Dolby's "Airhead":
Quod erat demonstrandum, baby! (Oh, you speak French!)
"habeus corpus sim sala bim, boopty do!" LMAO!
Nicely done. I can't wait till you write the scene where his heart explodes and instead of helping him, his familiars go through his pockets and take pictures of his final moments.
These need a Goblin style soundtrack like Argento used for Susperia- a near subaudible buzz that provides a suitable skin crawl.
This turned up in a Google search. I know I've used it before, maybe not here. I probably attributed it to O'Hara. So what if it's really a Maugham tell. The original was probably written in cuneiform. Anyway, what a great story.
I swear I'm going to live to see him keep his appointment.
The Appointment in Samarra"
(as retold by W. Somerset Maugham [1933])
The speaker is Death
There was a merchant in Bagdad who sent his servant to market to buy provisions and in a little while the servant came back, white and trembling, and said, Master, just now when I was in the marketplace I was jostled by a woman in the crowd and when I turned I saw it was Death that jostled me. She looked at me and made a threatening gesture, now, lend me your horse, and I will ride away from this city and avoid my fate. I will go to Samarra and there Death will not find me. The merchant lent him his horse, and the servant mounted it, and he dug his spurs in its flanks and as fast as the horse could gallop he went. Then the merchant went down to the marketplace and he saw me standing in the crowd and he came to me and said, Why did you make a threating getsture to my servant when you saw him this morning? That was not a threatening gesture, I said, it was only a start of surprise. I was astonished to see him in Bagdad, for I had an appointment with him tonight in Samarra.
As recited by Boris Karloff in Bogdonavich's 1968 Targets. Link upon request.
"a near subaudible buzz that provides a suitable skin crawl"
Reminds me of the moment in Orpheu Negro when the samba abruptly stops as Death chases Euridice into the streetcar barn and suddenly the angry bee sound of the transformers is everywhere. Bad things, man...
Good one. I didn't think anything could make me laugh about this.
I wish that Biden would use his newly acquired presidential immunity to order Trump, his family, and anyone who supports him to be permanently expelled from the United States of America.
Matt Gaetz in a Blazers jersey? What did Portland do to deserve that?
He gets his drip off the rack
Drip for a drip
This is a use of the word "drip" with which I was heretofore unfamiliar.
The events of the world overwhelm me: and my own life needs attention: I'm offline until Friday or maybe Monday. I read everything eventually..
Roy I'd like you to do the Sedition Six as necromancers: raising Madison, Hamilton, etc. to have them consider issues they never imagined and couldn't imagine, to be puppets for the Federalist Society...
I could see Roger Stone as Eugene Tooms from the X-Files, building his nest to hibernate.
Something like this is the Final Episode of Checkmate Lincolnites. Except it's a Nazi raising the Confederate leadership and then fighting against Union re-enactors
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gyt0bZms5zU&list=PLwCiRao53J1y_gqJJOH6Rcgpb-vaW9wF0&index=10
Protestors outside the Supreme Court had it right: https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/51PuLqHMWcL._SL1500_.jpg
This corrupt, illegitimate court is drunk with power and worse than the Taney court. Almost worse than the Marbury vs Madison court, who gifted us this abomination in the first place with their power grab.
Deep cut!
This court is the fruit of their poison tree, if you will.
Still waiting for the NYT to finish up its endless cycle of “Dems in disarray over debate” stories and discover the American Republic was murdered yesterday and its body dumped in an alley off Pennsylvania Avenue. The Biden Crime Family now has the go-ahead to arrest every perjured and corrupt Justice and replace them with judges who can read English. Gotta replace Garland first, of course. Alvin Bragg comes to mind.
Per the debate fallout, Yas got that covered:
https://yastreblyansky.substack.com/p/kenobi-vs-vader
"If he's so infirm he needs to resign, then he should resign and we'd have to live with it, but if you think he's fine for presidenting from now to January, just not for campaigning, then you're thinking it for the wrong reasons: not that he's unfit for office, but that Somebody Else wrongly thinks he is. This is a case, finally, where we should do what Republicans would do, as long as we can: double down."
NYT: "The President now has the unlimited, centralized power of a sovereign emperor. Here's why that's bad news for President Joe Biden."
Just further evidence that we're living in a computer simulation or the like. As for a counter-argument, I read an article the other day about how art explained the world much better than facts that used climate change as an example and cited five instances from Shakespeare that explained humanity's inability to do anything about it. Very good, I thought, but is there anything in art that explains how everything we were taught, and beyond that, everything the most cynical thought we understood, turned out to be ridiculously naive when it came to how fast American democracy could devolve into a monkey house?
The Scream. That is the instruction from the world of art.
Myself, I'm overflowing with explanations, where I'm coming up a little short is on what the fuck to do about any of it.
Hamilton Nolan is touting a General Strike when the time comes. With which I cannot disagree.
Speaking of the simulation: There's that great moment at the climax of the first Matrix, when Neo realizes everything. It cuts to his p.o.v., and he sees that the agents, and the hallway they're in, are just a cascade of code. They hold that for two seconds, tops, and it's thrilling.
I keep waiting to experience a similar moment, but so far it hasn't come.
I personally keep yelling "Computer, end simulation!" but that hasn't worked yet.
Wait a minute. My simulation keeps ending for no reason...what the...
I do think our art ill-prepared us for this moment, because since 1945 it has rendered Nazis as methodical, pure evil. We all feel sure we would recognize that -- it wears a black uniform! We can beat it with Heroism! We would have been better served by movies depicting the gradual undermining of shared institutions by circus-freak rightwing liars reacting to social liberalization with cries of fear that our Way of Life is Under Attack. I mean really it was in 1932 a very similar straight line from drag queen story hour to the reichstag fire. But in art -- and in public school, and in endless cable documentaries -- we are taught it had more to do with inflation + Hitler than with how 20% of the population are fragile bedwetting morons with "conservative" [authoritarian] instincts getting worked up by a handful of sociopathic, power-mad morons telling them it's okay to burn down all of civilization because then there will be only Traditional White People Forever.
Right now there's probably a lot of people in France having their "It can't happen here" moment, just like many of us did in 2016. At least I'm past that shit. What does it say about America that someone like Donald Trump could not only get elected once, but twice? It says we're a normal country, afflicted with the same problem every normal country has: An anxious middle class that's more desirous of order* than justice, who never really took all this "freedom" and "democracy" shit seriously, willing to throw it all over if it causes the slightest inconvenience to them.
You say 20%, I'd say about a third, and when only about half the population votes, that'll do it.
*You might think it strange that anyone would see Agent of Chaos Donald Trump as a source of "order", but the word here needs to be understood as "the natural order" where they are on top and everyone else knows their place.
(France has already had one Vichy and Le Pen is *not* about to institute another one, so there's that. Also, like a certain former President, she's on Putin's payroll and has been for years.)
"natural order" = The Hierarchy
It is shocking to see your fellow countrymen show up in hate of you and the country. That's the thing we are going to have to contend with in 2028 no matter what happens this year. The shockingly high percent of our population (I think actual science puts it at 28%) with the authoritarian personality -- that is, Americans who actually do not want democracy or rule of law -- who have been supercharged since 2016.
Related: On Twitter the past 24 hours there's been the saga of a woman who tweeted how her one-year-old loves peaches, so her wonderful husband went to the store to buy a peach. Hundreds of angry parents descended to reply "You are spoiling your child! You must say NO!" You might expect "provider provides, wife/mother charmed" would align with their kinder-kuche trad shtick, but the woman also had "MD" next to her name and I wonder if that had anything to do with how they lost their marbles. Anyway my thought was "This is why we can't have nice things. All these angry people from stern, broken families who don't realize it. All these people who would take more joy in saying NO than in finding a peach for a one-year-old girl who loves peaches. All these people who think law & order means authority figures living their lives selfishly without trying to make life decent for anyone else."
"It is shocking to see your fellow countrymen show up in hate of you and the country."
Wish I could say I was surprised, but as a Black American. . .
Yeah, I thought of that as soon as I tapped "post"...
I wonder if the ruling could help Biden in cases where he acts legally. As usual, the Right will claim that what he does is illegal; now, however, all they'll be able to claim is that Biden's action falls into the newly-minted teacup of unofficial acts. What MAGA says is wrong and/or illegal won't matter any more to domestic and world opinion than it already does. So be very bold, but keep it defensible, or at least plausible?
What the fuck am I even talking about.
MAGA thinks everyone who isn't MAGA is "wrong and/or illegal"; they're not going to take away the powers of the current President, or his or my right to exist, by (pre) judicial fiat.
"Mr President, are you acting officially?"
"Well, as you can plainly see, I AM in my office."
"Yes Sir. That's good enough for us."
"Good. Now move along and send in Taylor – I hear she has a following, and she's got plenty ideas about how to fix this sorry old country..."
"Merrick, what do you think about what the former president says?"
"Sir, I think his words are in opposition to our democratic order, and put our nation in peril."
"Alright, Merrick – would you say they present a genuine threat?"
"Why, yes, yes Sir, I think they do."
"Mr Attorney General, I hereby direct you, as part of my official duties, to take whatever steps are necessary, up to and including, for instance, physical gags, removing all access to media, breaking his thumbs so he cannot text, and prohibiting all other persons to have any contact of any sort whatsoever with the Clear and Present Danger to our nation."
"Sir, I think that would be a gross dereliction of duty and I refuse..."
(Seal Team 6 enters the room)
"..to hesitate one more second to carry out your lawful order, sir yes sir."
"There's a good boy."
"Deb, in your considered opinion, do we have enough protected lands here in the United States?"
"Ah, Mr President, thank you for asking. As you suggested some while ago, I've been going over the maps, and conclude that there's roughly 3 million square miles all told in the 50 states, and about 1 million are already in public ownership of one sort or another. So my estimate is we should add some more to the public lands – say, 2 million square miles or so."
"Madame Secretary, please pull that together in one package for national monument designation, and have it on my desk tomorrow."
[Several Cabinet Secretaries crowding around outside the door of the Oval Office, all calling out at once]
"Mr President? Mr President?"
"Hold on, hold on alla yins – you'll get your turns. But do not come in here unless your ideas are bigger than anyone ever imagined. Have I made myself clear?"
"Yes Sir!"
[the buzz in the outer room is palpable]
"Oh, oh. This place here in Florida, this just got declared protected Federal land, no construction allowed. Well! As an official act I'm going to have to act to keep this land cleared."
"Got it, Mr. President. The drones are on the way to Mar-a-Largo as we speak."
"breaking his thumbs so he cannot text"
Trump finds himself knocking on the door of Piper Laurie's apartment, "They... they broke my thumbs."
[Piper, appalled to be seen anywhere near him]
"Get the fuck outta here!"
"I may pick up strange men in a bus station, but I HAVE MY STANDARDS."
Help me out here: The President calls up his Attorney General and threatens to fire him if he doesn't launch an immediate investigation into vote fraud based on claims they both know are lies. It's an official act, see, because obviously the President has a right to hire and fire Attorneys General? The fact that it's in furtherance of a much larger corrupt scheme to defraud the United States, installing the guy who lost in the White House, we'll just pretend not to see that. Just take each act individually (the President called the Georgia Secretary of State and demanded 11,000 more votes? Well, doesn't a President, from time to time, use a telephone in the course of his official duties?) and refuse to see the conspiracy they're a part of.
It's like their ruling on bribery - er, excuse me, gratuities - someone gives a politician a little gift after an official decision comes down, who can say it was a bribe? We just see a little money changing hands, who knows what it's for? Not us, who are we to judge?
Yeah, that was a gratuitous ruling also.
Biden should introduce a bill to replace the entire Supreme Court with those three monkeys. On second thought, just two monkeys, "Speak no evil" won't be needed, thanks.
Bill? Bill? He don't need to steenkin' bill.
"I am adding six new seats to the Supreme Court effective immediately under Chief Justice AOC".
Ha ha, Biden's the kind of guy who might take this extraordinary step and then somehow find SIX Merrick Garlands.
Hearted, but OOF
And now according to the same SCOTUS assclowns, we know it's perfectly okay to bribe government officials as long as you do it AFTER the act.
Can anyone explain their reasoning there? I mean specifically, why they didn't come down in favor of before, during AND after?
You know how they sometimes have those bill-signing ceremonies, where a Governor or President will use a succession of different pens to form their signature, handing each pen off to someone involved in the creation of the bill? Suppose we had a similar ceremony, where as each letter of his name is formed, a bagful of cash drops from the ceiling.
"Mr President of the Universe? Can I have a word wi-"
"Not now and maybe not ever. What did we talk about? You see the sign?"
"Oh, yeah – sorry Your Royal Dudeness" [hands over sacks of cash]
"Now that we've got the before/after thing outta the way (and why the 'final R-biters' did that one before the Big Finale I do not understand), and understanding that everything I say is official duty, just be certain to bring the tribute up front, OK? Everything I do is official, everything I say is official, everything I think is official. Got it? Now get outta here before I take all your oil wells and your hot wife by eminent domain!"
"Now get outta here before I take all your oil wells and your hot wife by eminent domain!"
Very old headline from The Onion: "Jenna Bush's Federally Protected Wetlands Now Open for Drilling."
Oldy but goody!
Hell, you don't tip the waitress or bellhop or cabbie until AFTER they've provided you with service, right? Same idea.
Sure, and maybe the waiter provides better service in anticipation that it might get them a bigger tip, nothing wrong with that, right? Just like if a politician... oh, wait, this analogy isn't working so good.
SCOTUS made bribery legal in 2016 with a unanimous ruling in McDonnell vs. United States. Roberts' majority opinion stated "the meaning of "official act" does not include merely setting up a meeting, calling another public official, or hosting an event."
So, the Georgia trial may still be OK, or else all the corrupt doofuses that had their convictions vacated by McDonnell should go back to jail
There are three coëqual branches of government… but some branches are more coëqual than others.
Well, until they suddenly discover in January of 2025 that the Executive branch is, in fact, the most coëqual of all.
But they reserve the right to be coëqual-est when the mood suits them.
Giving a small group of people unlimited power seems to be ending badly, who could have imagined?
[wailing] Will not our black-robed legal demigods save us? [rends garments]
Render unto seamstress that which are seamstress's*
*members in good standing of the Seamsters Union
"Look for the union label
When you're buying a coat, dress, or blouse"
Once upon a time, kids, unions used to have actual goddamn commercials on the electric teevee. Undoubtedly yet another thing we can thank the rotting corpse of R.W. Reagan for, the shit.
OK, any column with a Jonny Quest reference gets 100 points. Thank you Boss!