Or maybe it’s a silly people interlude. The dogs have a reason for doing it—they were trained with a food treat:
Now, here’s a creative idea for building the border wall
The New York Post’s Michael Goodwin received a letter from one of his reader’s last week, a gentleman by the name of Nolan Thomson Hare. Concerned over the refusal of Congressional leaders to fund a border wall, Hare wrote: “Can you please give me a note about where I can find a campaign organized to collect money from the general public?”
Goodwin posed this idea to his readers and one suggested that if each of Trump’s 63 million voters contributed $80, the wall could be built.
Interesting.
I doubt that enough money could actually be collected, though. It’s one thing to support a policy in theory, it’s another to actually shell out money for it. The ratio of the number of people willing to personally fund the wall to the number of people merely in favor of the wall’s construction is unknown, but the second group is probably a great deal larger than the first.
The Cohen plea and the Daniels payments: not even a crime
Were Trump’s payments to Stormy Daniels via Michael Cohen a crime of any sort? Bradley A. Smith at National Review says “no”:
…the law — following our common sense — tells us that the hush-money payments outlined by the U.S. Attorney are clearly not campaign expenditures. There is no violation of the Federal Election Campaign Act.
To reach the opposite conclusion, the U.S. Attorney is placing all his chips on the language “for the purpose of influencing an election.” Intuitively, however, we all know that such language cannot be read literally — if it were, virtually every political candidate of the past 45 years has been in near-constant violation…
So what does it mean to be “for the purpose of influencing an[] election”? To understand this, we read the statutory language in conjunction other parts of the statute. Here the key is the statute’s prohibition on diverting campaign funds to “personal use.” This is a crucial distinction, because one of the primary factors separating campaign funds from personal funds is that the former must be spent on the candidate’s campaign, while the latter can be used to buy expensive vacations, cars, watches, furs, and such. The law defines “personal use” as spending “used to fulfill any commitment, obligation, or expense of a person that would exist irrespective of the candidate’s election campaign.” So a candidate may intend for good toothpaste and soap, a quality suit, and a healthy breakfast to positively influence his election, but none of those are campaign expenditures…
…Mr. Trump had many valid, non-electoral reasons for trying to keep these allegations quiet, most notably family harmony, protecting family members (especially his young son, Baron), and preserving his future viability as a television personality in case he lost the election…
…Michael Cohen is pleading guilty to something that isn’t a crime. Of course, people will do that when a zealous prosecutor is threatening them with decades in prison. But his admissions are not binding on President Trump, and Trump should fight these charges ferociously.
Many Americans have convinced themselves that Trump is a uniquely dangerous and bad man, such that any available tool should be used to expel him from office. But in that way lies the bigger threat to our democracy and rule of law.
And who is author Bradley A. Smith? Oh, just a former chairman of the Federal Election Commission. So hey, what does he know about campaign finance law?
Here’s another article that says much the same thing, but adds this:
In Buckley v. Valeo, the Supreme Court determined that there had to be some limits placed on what could be considered “for the purposes of influencing” an election and thus determined it could be applied only to electoral statements that urged voters to expressly advocate for or against a candidate. If statements did not have those words of express advocacy – clear statements of support or opposition to named candidates – then they cannot be considered expenditures. Not publishing a story has no content – it cannot contain express advocacy – and thus cannot be an expenditure subject to the FECA.
Furthermore, no federal court has ruled that not influencing an election constitutes influencing an election. The federal government tried that theory once before, when Senator John Edwards had help supporting his mistress to keep his affair quiet…[T]his creative legal theory by the prosecutors has never previously been successfully used against anyone during FECA’s 45-plus years in existence…
Cohen probably took the plea bargain because he was threatened with a long prison sentence and financial impoverishment on the many financial and tax charges unrelated to any dealings with President Trump. On Wednesday, Cohen was sentenced to three years, which was a pittance compared to the likely threatened decades of imprisonment.
This is what the entire prosecution of Cohen was about in the first place: getting him to make allegations that would implicate Trump in return for leniency. The prosecutors were no doubt hoping for something more against Trump than they actually got, but they had to make do with what they had, and if they had to twist their legal reasoning into pretzels to do so, they were up to that task.
No court has to buy it, either, because they are working in the court of public opinion and the plan is to justify an impeachment.
Would you like a genetic test kit for Christmas?
Years ago I thought it sounded like a nifty idea. But in recent years I’ve decided no, not so much.
First of all, a sibling of mine did it already so I pretty much know the general picture—which I already knew anyway. There were no surprises, either.
But also, I have come to utterly distrust the reassurances that information will be kept strictly confidential. As this article says:
23andMe says that it doesn’t share, sell or lease any data to its collaborators’ without customers’ explicit consent. When it does have permission to share data, the data is not personally identifiable and is shared in aggregate, according to the company. Ancestry also allows data to be used for research only with consumers’ permission, said Jennifer Utley, its director of research.
Still, the Federal Trade Commission warned in a blog post last year that consumers should recognize the risks of handing their genetic information over to a company, saying “hacks happen.”
“That tiny sample can disclose the biological building blocks of what makes you you,” FTC Bureau of Consumer Protection senior attorney Leslie Fair wrote in the post. “The data can be very enlightening personally, but a major concern for consumers should be who else could have access to information about your heritage and your health.”
What’s more, I don’t want to know if I’m genetically predisposed to getting some dread disease that I can’t do anything about. Apparently you can opt out of that aspect of it. But do most people realize that?
The lure of the de-clutter book
I saw a link to this book at Instapundit. It’s called Real Life Organizing: Clean and Clutter-Free in 15 Minutes a Day.
As soon as I saw that, I felt the old seductive pull: maybe I should buy that, I thought. Maybe that one will finally do the trick.
It’s not that I’m so dreadfully disorganized or cluttered. But I’m certainly no neat freak, and organizational ability is not my strong suit. There was a time, back in my young mother/wife days, when I was a sucker for books like that, until I saw that they were merely adding to the clutter. That’s when I decided that de-cluttering books only really help the already-organized get even more organized.
For example, when I followed the link to the book’s Amazon listing, I discovered that according to the book the following is the first item people are supposed to do to become organized: create a household management binder.
As soon as I read that sort of thing I feel an incredible lassitude come over me.
Many decades ago I got rid of all the books I owned on de-cluttering my home. It felt good. But maybe I’ll just buy this one…just one…
Nostalgia for the day of the WASP
The death and funeral of George H. W. Bush caused NY Times columnist Ross Douthat to write a piece called “Why We Miss the WASPs.” It contains the usual digs at Trump, of course, but it also expresses some un-PC ideas about WASPs. Here’s an excerpt [my observations are in brackets]:
The nostalgia flowing since the passing of George H.W. Bush has many wellsprings: admiration for the World War II generation and its dying breed of warrior-politicians, the usual belated media affection for moderate Republicans, the contrast between the elder Bush’s foreign policy successes and the failures of his son, and the contrast between any honorable politician and the current occupant of the Oval Office. [Douthat ignores the fact that the failure of Bush senior to take out Saddam Hussein led to Bush junior’s foreign policy moves in Iraq, and also that the main reason Bush senior is being hailed is that Trump critics see it is a good way to take a jab at Trump.]
…Writing in The Atlantic, Peter Beinart described the elder Bush as the last president deemed “legitimate” by both of our country’s warring tribes — before the age of presidential sex scandals [there was plenty of presidential sex scandal material in the 20th century, but no actual scandals only because the press acted to cover them up rather than to expose them], plurality-winning and popular-vote-losing chief executives [this had happened before, although earlier in history], and white resentment of the first black president [Douthat is repeating liberal talking points that cast disapproval of Obama as inherently racist, an error of logic but a productive propaganda point]. Also in The Atlantic, Franklin Foer described “the subtext” of Bush nostalgia as a “fondness for a bygone institution known as the Establishment, hardened in the cold of New England boarding schools, acculturated by the late-night rituals of Skull and Bones, sent off to the world with a sense of noblesse oblige. For more than a century, this Establishment resided at the top of the American caste system. Now it is gone, and apparently people wish it weren’t.” [It certainly isn’t completely gone at all, just disparaged]…
Put simply, Americans miss Bush because we miss the WASPs…
The WASPs are hardly gone, as I already said. They’re still fairly prominent in government positions—and in fact, although most people don’t think of it that way, Trump himself is somewhat of a WASP, at least technically if the broader meaning of the term (which stretches the definition to include people of Scottish descent) is used. Trump’s certainly white, he’ Protestant and he went to an Ivy League school (University of Pennsylvania).
I really think the nostalgia is less for WASPs and more for a time of relative unity and respect than for anything else. That time is gone—and it was gone even when the WASP son of Bush senior, Bush junior, was president.
If Trump is a WASP or at least somewhat of a WASP, he’s a WASP who violates the WASP rules. He’s taken a leaf out of Muhammad Ali’s “I’m the Greatest” book—and bragging is most definitely not a WASP trait. Trump’s not polite. He’s not refined. He’s not a gentleman (although he can be one when called for and when he makes up his mind to be). He didn’t go to Yale or Princeton or Harvard. He’s not old money—although he was raised with wealth—or of Mayflower origin.
Bush senior was a gentleman, and Bush junior was one as well although of a different style. As such, they got taken advantage of politically by those who were not gentlemen.
[NOTE: The title of this post is a riff on this.]
Mueller’s response to Judge Sullivan is…interesting
U.S. District Court Judge Emmet G. Sullivan, who is overseeing Michael Flynn’s case, demanded that the Special Counsel [Mueller] submit copies of FBI 302 reports from Flynn’s January 24th FBI interview as well as then-FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe’s memorandum from that day…
Judge Sullivan had set a deadline of 3 pm Friday which Mueller met. He included a cover letter warning the judge not to “minimize” the seriousness of the charges against Flynn. Missing from the documents was the original and crucial FBI 302 report. FBI rules require that a 302 report be prepared within five days of an interview. Instead, Fox News reports that the 302 submitted to Judge Sullivan was dated July 19, 2017 and “specifically came from an interview with Strzok in which the Flynn encounter was discussed — and not the original Flynn interview.” Worse still, this report was heavily redacted. One and a half pages were completely redacted.
The FBI’s treatment of Flynn—and its stonewalling about revealing what actually occurred, as well as its possible destruction or at least hiding of relevant documents—would be shocking if we hadn’t grown accustomed to such outrageous actions by what people have come to call the Deep State (otherwise known as unelected government officials). It’s still outrageous and wrong, but not shocking.
Law professor Jonathan Turley had this to say about it in an interview with Tucker Carlson:
…[Turley] said the case against Flynn was a “canned hunt” and investigators effectively “put him in a cage and shot him” by bringing him up on charges of lying during an interview brought about under unorthodox means.
Even if Flynn is ultimately exonerated, the intended damage to him and to the Trump administration has been done. That damage is not just to Flynn or even to Trump, however, it’s to the rule of law and to the feeling of trust much of America used to have in our own government.
Judge rules Obamacare unconstitutional
This was the basis for the ruling:
Reed O’Connor, a federal judge in the Northern District of Texas, just killed Obamacare…
With the removal of the mandate penalty, the mandate no longer was a function of Congress’ taxing power, which was the basis upon which John Roberts and the liberal Justices on the Supreme Court upheld the constitutionality of the mandate in 2012…
The district court ruled that the mandate was an essential and inseverable part of Obamacare. Because the mandate was held to be unconstitutional and inseverable, the judge held the remainder of Obamacare to be unconstitutional.
Before you get too excited about this, let me add that the judge didn’t issue an injunction, so the ruling has no practical effect at the moment.
It also seems to me that, because Obamacare effectively destroyed the old individual insurance market, including its high-risk pools for pre-existing conditions (a phenomenon the existence of which keeps being ignored in discussions of the pre-Obamacare health insurance picture), to stop Obamacare in its tracks doesn’t make sense without an alternative system ready to be put in its place. That’s what “repeal and replace” meant. The old system—which was nowhere near as bad as its critics have made it out to be—no longer exists, so it can’t be relied on as fallback.
What’s more, this ruling may be reversed on appeal. But still, it’s interesting news.
Costco beer tastes “like urine”
But my question is: how would they know?
Ruth Bader Ginsburg and the Flynn case issues
Way back in 1996, when the Trump presidency was in the two-decades-distant future, Ruth Bader Ginsburg had this to say:
The prospect remains that an overzealous prosecutor or investigator — aware that a person has committed some suspicious acts, but unable to make a criminal case — will create a crime by surprising the suspect, asking about those acts, and receiving a false denial…
…[Law’s] encompassing formulation arms Government agents with authority not simply to apprehend lawbreakers, but to generate felonies, crimes of a kind that only a Government officer could prompt.
She certainly was correct. But I wonder what she’d be saying now.
At any rate, we’re in the situation in which government officials are creating crimes (or alleged crimes) that would otherwise not occur, and using them for political destruction.
No more taxpayer-funded settlements for sexual harassment claims against members of Congress
In the light of allegations from the left that Trump’s payments to Stormy Daniels vie Michael Cohen constituted a campaign law violation, this news is deeply ironic:
Now Congress has agreed on a bill that members of Congress will be responsible for their own settlements instead of the tax payer. As of now, “settlements are paid through taxpayer-funded accounts members use to pay for office salaries and expenses.”
Hmmm—wouldn’t all of this be campaign finance violations, if Trump’s was?
Just about everyone I’ve read on the subject of this bill applauds the change. It makes sense, doesn’t it? After all, why should taxpayers foot the bill for the sexual indiscretions of the powerful members of Congress?
No reason except—except—there’s the problem of the power of false accusations What percentage of accusations are valid and what percentage false I do not know, but I do know that false allegations can crush someone politically and financially. I believe that was probably at least part of the reason for the establishment of the Congressional slush fund in the first place. Without it, I fear that the prospect of financial and personal ruin for a politician when facing such allegations constitutes even greater motivation to make them.
In the real world of politics and of business and of life in general, payments are often made in settlements of the sort even when claims are baseless. Payments do not constitute recognition of guilt. With the slush fund, the payments made constituted a motivation for false accusations, and without the slush fund, the same is true. But without the fund, the prospect of ruin for a politician is greater whether the accusations are true or whether they are false.
Maybe some commenter who knows more than I do about how this would work can see a flaw in my reasoning. I’d like for the new bill to solve the problem, but I just don’t see it doing so at all.
More here:
The legislation would hold members of Congress personally liable for awards and settlements that stem from acts of harassment and related retaliation they personally commit. There would also be a preliminary review of the merits of the claim by a hearing officer. Those elements, some of which already apply to House members, would also apply to members who have left Congress.
“We are shifting the balance of power to more clearly protect the victim and create a more level operating place,” said Rep. Jackie Speier (D., Calif.), who has been one of the biggest advocates for the reforms on Capitol Hill.
Who are these “hearing officers” and what standards will they be using? We already know what happened on campuses. I’m not a big one for special protection for members of Congress, and I certainly am aware that sexual harassment is a big problem in politics. But I’m also aware of the potential for false allegations, and the many motives to make them: politics, revenge, money, fifteen minutes of fame, he/said she/said misunderstandings, and there are probably some others I’ve left out.
The Weekly Standard is no more
Before I had my political change, I wasn’t particularly aware of which periodicals and newspapers were on the right. I knew of a couple—the WSJ and the Manchester Union Leader, for example. I knew who William F. Buckley was from TV rather than print, and maybe if you’d said “National Review” to me I could have identified it as being on the right. But then again, maybe not.
And that was about it.
One of the consequences of my political change was that I became familiar with the political stance of different media outlets—newspapers, magazines, and TV stations—to which I’d previously not paid all that much attention. The Weekly Standard was one, as well as National Review and Commentary, which I thought of as the Big Three of non-newspaper print journalism on the right.
Two are still standing, in one form or another. One just bit the dust: the Weekly Standard. Most commentators seem to think it’s because it fell into a very deep and monomaniacal NeverTrump hole, much deeper than either of the others. But I noticed its decline even before that, although I can’t put my finger on exactly when it began. However, I also think the fact that it ultimately turned into a bunch of Captain Ahabs pursuing the Trump White Whale probably hastened its demise.
Prior to that, however, the Weekly Standard had long been kind to me, as was Bill Kristol. So although my own connection with them ended several years ago, I have a soft spot in my heart for them (my favorite piece of the ones I wrote for them is this).
I don’t think the end of the magazine is a good sign for the right. But I admit I stopped reading the publication years ago, not just because I didn’t agree with them—although I definitely have often disagreed with them—but because they became one-note, uninteresting, and unedifying.