US Politics Thread |OT| THE DARKEST TIMELINE

[Kara]

‘But what about the evident similarity between your “valuations” and the market prices of a capitalist economy?’ asked Boyarskii, who was sounding rather strained.

‘It’s true that there is a formal resemblance,’ said Leonid Vitalevich. ‘But they have a completely different origin, and therefore a completely different meaning. Whereas market prices are formed spontaneously, objective valuations — shadow prices — must be computed on the basis of an optimal plan. As the plan targets change, the valuations change. They are subordinate to the very different production relationships of a socialist society. Yet, yet, the scope for their use is actually bigger under socialism. The capitalists actually agree with you, Dr Boyarskii, that the mathematical methods we’re talking about should only be applied on the small scale, on the level of the individual firm. They have no choice: there is no larger structure, in the economy of West Germany or the United States, in which they can be set to work. They have had some success, I believe. I’m sorry to say that, since George Danzig and Tjalling Koopmans made their discoveries of “linear programming” in America during the war, the techniques have been adopted there far more eagerly, far more quickly, than in the Soviet Union. Linear programmers in the USA calculate routes for airlines, and devise the investment policies of Wall Street corporations. But we still have an opportunity before us which is closed to the capitalists. Capitalism cannot calculate an optimum for a whole economy at once. We can. There is a fundamental harmony between optimal planning and the nature of socialist society.

kara

Red Plenty is atomicpunk for tankies.

[recursivelyenumerable]

atomicpunk for tankies.

 

[benjipwns]

[I'm a Puppy!]

http://www.politico.com/story/2015/03/hillarys-nerd-squad-116402.html

Hillary Clinton is assembling a technology team that signals a significant departure from her 2008 presidential run, led by Obama veterans and geared toward recasting her analog-era image.

With the hiring of 2012 Obama campaign alumni Teddy Goff as chief digital strategist, Elan Kriegel as analytics director and Andrew Bleeker as a top outside adviser, the campaign is indicating a greater emphasis on the kinds of cutting-edge techniques that both parties now routinely use to tap into every possible fundraising dollar and seek out every available voter. Just as important, the new hires point to a candidate who’s learned from a 2008 campaign marked by its inability to harness technology to its advantage.

The presumptive Democratic front-runner is building a New York-based campaign that senior party operatives say could ultimately be staffed with more than 1,000 data geeks, techies and digital gurus. Interviews for more tech-focused slots are happening “on the half hour for what will be dozens of early hires,” one longtime Clinton aide explained of the operation, which could see its technology fleet grow roughly three times larger than Obama’s 2012 reelection effort.

...

“All those guys are great,” Harper Reed, Obama’s 2012 chief technology officer, said of the Clinton hires. “If that’s who they are picking then they’re focused on the right thing. They’re not focused on B.S. politics. They’re focused on how to get this shit done. And they know it’s going to be hard because Republicans are focused on the same thing.”

Goff, who had a pivotal role shaping Obama’s reelection campaign in 2012, is also expected to have a direct line to Clinton that should give his tech team better leverage during the shaping of budgets, public messaging and ad buys. Goff, who did not respond to requests for comment, said in an interview last summer that he thought Clinton was already doing a solid job building her tech credentials in the aftermath of the 2008 campaign
.
“They get it,” Goff told POLITICO last June. “And they don’t get it in a ‘Check the box, I get it’ way.”

Taken together, the Clinton team constitutes a who’s who of the Democratic digital world. Bleeker, who handled online advertising for her 2008 primary campaign before moving into Obama’s orbit for the general election, founded the Democratic tech firm Bully Pulpit Interactive. He returned to work for Obama in the 2012 campaign and also partnered with Mook on the McAuliffe 2013 race. Dowd has some of the closest direct ties to Clinton after serving most recently as her senior tech adviser at the Clinton Foundation, as new media director at the State Department and as digital fundraising chief during the 2008 campaign — when she helped raise more than $100 million. Dowd’s close relationship with Clinton “will empower the rest of the squad,” said one Democratic tech operative.

...

While Clinton has started building an “A-team” of Democratic tech experts, Rasiej, the founder of civic tech non-profit Personal Democracy Media, warned that she still faces a much bigger challenge showing that she’s “engaged, present, listening, involved and understanding the two-way dynamic of the medium.”

“If they build a fortress around her and they’re tweeting and videotaping from a fortress,” he said, “the public will notice.”

So Hillary will build a fortress for herself but won't build a fortress on our border to keep out the illegals from stealing our welfare and our elections. This used to be a great country like in 1884 and 1924 when important things got done without any of this brain dead gadgetry.

I've seen the data machine that the Obama campaign used. And I've also seen the data "machine" that Romney used.
Data is what will win you elections. In this case, the dems understand and have that market cornered.
When it comes to data technology Republicans are like a promoter trying to sell out a Radio City Music Hall with nothing but B tier christian rock bands.

[benjipwns]

And I've also seen the data "machine" that Romney used.

Yeah, we could all see him on TV dude.

[I'm a Puppy!]

Seriously though, you'd think someone in charge of an investment firm and all that would know how to hire someone to do data analysis.
As I understand it, their data machine never actually fully got off the ground and it was millions over budget.

[benjipwns]

IIRC, all their campaign infrastructure was like that.

The Paul campaign was the only one that actually prepared for the primaries start to finish. And had a general election budget strategy, even if unlikely to ever be used.

Everyone else was assuming they could buy a campaign up later, which was how it traditionally worked. (Though 1996 and 2004 should have really made it clear that's not the case anymore against an incumbent.)

Santorum and Gingrich's campaigns didn't even remember to file to get on the ballot in a bunch of states, Gingrich most of all, there wasn't even really any campaign except for his showing up at debates and whatever Sheldon Adelson was throwing money away on.

[benjipwns]

I think Mitt's post-politics career as a comedian is going much better though:

spoiler (click to show/hide)

HA HAHAHA

[close]

[benjipwns]

Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) announced Friday he would not seek reelection, a decision that upends the hierarchy in the Senate Democratic Caucus and the political landscape in Nevada.

In a farewell video, Reid, 75, cited his brutal eye injury in January as the reason he decided to forgo a Senate race next year.

"I've had time to ponder and to think," Reid said.

[Great Rumbler]

It would be nice to see some new blood in the Dem leadership, but the most likely move is to shift Durbin or Schumer into the top spot.

[benjipwns]

Obligatory Harry Reid story:

In 1977, O’Callaghan appointed him to the chairmanship of the Nevada Gaming Commission, which oversees casinos, and that was an experience that made his other work look easy. Before Reid took the job, O’Callaghan introduced him to the outgoing chairman, Peter Echeverria. “Pete was telling us, ‘I’ve had people out here watching me, these gangsters,’ and he said, ‘I think they’ve tapped my phone,’ ” Reid recalled. “I thought he was making all this stuff up. It just didn’t make sense. I had no concept of the Mob. It meant nothing to me.” There had been a decrease in Mob activity, but organized crime was again investing in Las Vegas, and for four years Reid confronted wiseguys like Tony (the Ant) Spilotro, who had been sent to Las Vegas by a Chicago branch of La Cosa Nostra, “the Outfit,” and was known for killing his victims by squeezing their heads in a vise. In 1979, Reid barred Spilotro from all casinos.

In July of 1978, a man named Jack Gordon, who was later married to LaToya Jackson, offered Reid twelve thousand dollars to approve two new, carnival-like gaming devices for casino use. Reid reported the attempted bribe to the F.B.I. and arranged a meeting with Gordon in his office. By agreement, F.B.I. agents burst in to arrest Gordon at the point where Reid asked, “Is this the money?” Although he was taking part in a sting, Reid was unable to control his temper; the videotape shows him getting up from his chair and saying, “You son of a bitch, you tried to bribe me!” and attempting to choke Gordon, before startled agents pulled him off. “I was so angry with him for thinking he could bribe me,” Reid said, explaining his theatrical outburst. Gordon was convicted in federal court in 1979 and sentenced to six months in prison.

One day in 1981, Landra Reid noticed that the family station wagon was not running properly, and she discovered a cable under the hood and “something” sticking out of the gas tank. Police found a device that would have exploded had it been correctly grounded.

[Great Rumbler]

Reid endorsed New York Sen. Chuck Schumer, the third-ranking Democrat, within hours of his announcement.

Called it.

[I'm a Puppy!]

You can tell those people are completely stable because their video titles are in all caps.

[ZephyrFate]

I think a lot of Americans mistakenly think of Israel as an American aircraft carrier, ergo not supporting it is not supporting America by proxy.

Please understand, these are people who objectify human beings to such a degree that the actualization of national self-determination is assessed by whether or not it facilitates the return of their god to judge the living and the dead like it's the Cadaver Synod outchea.

yeah, it's usually when reading theopolitical polemic from this camp that I start thinking "hmm, maybe the plot of xenogears wasn't so sophomoric after all"

Whoa, whoa, whoa. Let's not give Xenogears' fucking stupid plot any sort of praise here. This stuff is EXACTLY as dumb as Xenogears' insipid, forced symbolism.

[benjipwns]

The free ticket gets me $8 off of parking? HOW MUCH IS PARKING FOR THIS ILLEGAL IMMIGRATION TRAITOR SPANISH NO REAL QUESTIONS MEETING?!?

[benjipwns]

lol at the host woman getting sucked into the USA! chanting for a moment out of confusion

and then it degrading into a guy who sounds like Homer Simpson being the only one saying it

[Kara]

why am i watching these videos

benjiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii

[Kara]

omg BLACK ETHNIC CLEANSING

[benjipwns]

the cop says "having said that" like six times in his explanation

[Kara]

You're watching them because they are pure unfiltered entertainment

this is the kind of shit you hear behind closed doors when it's "just us cacs"

ditto "jew landlords"

[benjipwns]

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/03/28/us/politics/no-copies-of-hillary-clinton-emails-on-server-lawyer-says.html
http://www.politico.com/story/2015/03/gowdy-clinton-wiped-her-server-clean-116472.html

WASHINGTON — An examination of the server that housed the personal email account that Hillary Rodham Clinton used exclusively when she was secretary of state showed that there are no copies of any emails she sent during her time in office, her lawyer told a congressional committee on Friday.

After her representatives determined which emails were government-related and which were private, a setting on the account was changed to retain only emails sent in the previous 60 days, her lawyer, David Kendall, said. He said the setting was altered after she gave the records to the government.

“Thus, there are no hdr22@clintonemail.com emails from Secretary Clinton’s tenure as secretary of state on the server for any review, even if such review were appropriate or legally authorized,” Mr. Kendall said in a letter to the House select committee investigating the 2012 attacks in Benghazi, Libya.

“While it is not clear precisely when Secretary Clinton decided to permanently delete all emails from her server, it appears she made the decision after October 28, 2014, when the Department of State for the first time asked the Secretary to return her public record to the Department,” Rep. Trey Gowdy (R-S.C.), chairman of the Select Committee on Benghazi, said in a statement.

...

Gowdy said that Clinton’s response to the subpoena means he and Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) will now contemplate new legal actions against Clinton.

“After seeking and receiving a two week extension from the Committee, Secretary Clinton failed to provide a single new document to the subpoena issued by the Committee and refused to provide her private server to the Inspector General for the State Department or any other independent arbiter for analysis,” Gowdy said.

...

The broad subpoena from Gowdy included any emails relating to Libya, weapons located in the country, the Benghazi attacks and administration statements following the attacks on the compound.

[Kara]

[Great Rumbler]

[Phoenix Dark]

Clinton doesn't give a shit

[Yeti]

Someone explain this Hillary email scandal. Republicans have cried wolf scandal so many times I don't really pay attention anymore.

[Great Rumbler]

Someone explain this Hillary email scandal. Republicans have cried wolf scandal so many times I don't really pay attention anymore.

something something Benghazi

[benjipwns]

Someone explain this Hillary email scandal. Republicans have cried wolf scandal so many times I don't really pay attention anymore.

Hillary deleted all her e-mails which she was keeping on a private server instead of the State Departments to cover up her lesbian affair which she was having while Benghazi went down and went told that they were dying she said "then let them die." And then wiped the server clean.

While when turning over other e-mails to the State Department she sent them 55,000 pages of hard copies of the e-mails she determined were "work-related" but secretly hidden in those documents is Obama's REAL birth certificate instead of the forgery but they haven't got through even 1/10th of them yet.

[Joe Molotov]

The broad subpoena

Sexism! 

[Kara]

You're watching them because they are pure unfiltered entertainment

this is the kind of shit you hear behind closed doors when it's "just us cacs"

ditto "jew landlords"

I'm a model minority who was in a frat in the south brav, you don't think I've heard this material before

No idea, California is enough of a hellhole and I'll be assed if I associate with Dixiecacs.

[brawndolicious]

I've rarely met a racist that hates all other races, most focus on how just one skin color/culture causes all this criminally delinquent behavior and they usually do shut up before I can respond. My only problem comes with flavor-of-the-month racists who are just ignorant and read something bad happening in xyz country that week. That's why sometimes when I people tell that I'm Iranian (rather than Persian) they compliment me on how much nicer and even better looking I am than they expected and then I hate them so much.

[Eric P]

[brawndolicious]

The Powers and Shelby case were just tragic, Powers was broken down completely even though he had no history of psychological issues. The end of the article might be too optimistic but hopefully those reforms end up being serious and prison-wide rather than just the ones listed on the lawsuit.

[benjipwns]

Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas), the only major declared Republican presidential candidate, is defending his credentials as a freshman senator while pursuing a White House bid.

“Unlike Barack Obama, I was not a community organizer before I was elected to the Senate,” Cruz said during an interview aired on CNN's "State of the Union."

"I spent five-and-a-half years as the solicitor general of Texas," Cruz said. "I supervised and led every appeal for the state of Texas in a 4,000-person agency with over 700 lawyers. And over the course of five-and-a-half years, over and over Texas led the nation defending conservative principles and winning."
 
Cruz panned Obama, a fellow Harvard Law graduate, as a "backbencher" during his time in the Senate.

"There are a lot more noticeable differences between us than similarities," Cruz said.

Hey! Obama was a meaningless state legislator too!

[Kara]

Being a lawyer in Texas is a negative, not a positive...

[benjipwns]

He wasn't just a lawyer, he was the top lawyer for defending the state against those who mostly likely wanted to reduce government or achieve justice against it in some form! Er, I mean...defend conservative principles!

Ted didn't have a great batting average arguing at the Supreme Court:

spoiler (click to show/hide)

Frew v. Hawkins (2004)

In 1996, Linda Frew and other citizens settled a class-action lawsuit in federal district court against the Texas Health and Human Services Commission. Settlement was reached through a consent agree, in which the parties make an agreement that is subject to court supervision. As part of this consent decree, Texas was supposed to improve health care for poor children to comply with a federally mandated program called Early and Periodic Screening, Diagnosis and Treatment. Two years later, Frew and others remained unsatisfied that Texas was complying with the federal requirements, and asked the court to force Texas to create a plan for how it would improve health care. Texas refused, however, claiming that it was immune from the court order under the 11th Amendment, which provides for state sovereignty. Texas argued that because no federal rights had been violated, suit could not be brought in federal court. The Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals agreed with Texas.

Decision: 9 votes for Frew, 0 vote(s) against
Legal provision: Amendment 11: Eleventh Amendment
Yes and no. In a unanimous opinion delivered by Justice Anthony Kennedy, the Court held that enforcement of the consent decree does not violate the 11th Amendment. The Court rejected the argument that a federal court cannot enforce a consent decree unless it finds a violation of federal law. "The decree here is a federal court order that springs from a federal dispute and furthers the objectives of federal law," Justice Kennedy wrote

Dretke v. Haley (2004)

Haley was convicted in Texas state courts of a felony theft and sentenced as a habitual felony offender (extending his sentence). After a failed appeal to the Texas appellate court, Haley filed a state habeas application in the trial court, arguing that his past crimes did not qualify him as a habitual offender and that his attorney had provided ineffective counsel when he failed to object to the extended sentence. The court dismissed his claims on procedural grounds, because he had not raised the issue during his trial and therefore could not raise it in the habeas petition. The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals denied his habeas application based on the trial court's findings.

Haley then filed for habeas corpus relief in federal district court. Pointing to the procedural-default doctrine, Texas argued that Haley's claim was procedurally barred from federal habeas review. Under the procedural-default doctrine, federal courts cannot grant habeas relief if the last state court rejected the appeal for procedural violations of state law; the only exception is if the petitioner is actually innocent.

The district court held that Haley showed he was "actually innocent" of earlier violations on which his sentence enhancement was based. The court ruled that Haley's sentence was therefore improperly extended. It never reached his ineffective assistance of counsel claim, having already found grounds for overturning the extended sentence. The U.S. Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed, rejecting Texas's argument that the actual-innocence exception applies only to cases involving capital offenses.

Decision: 6 votes for Dretke, 3 vote(s) against
Legal provision:
The Court declined to answer the question presented, ruling instead that the district court should have first considered the ineffective assistance of counsel claim before reaching the question of whether the "actual innocence" exception applies to non-capital cases. Justice Sandra Day O'Connor, for a seven-member majority, wrote that the ineffective assistance of counsel claim would accomplish the same thing - the reduction of the sentence - without burdening the state with the need to prove the existence of all prior convictions beyond a reasonable doubt.

Medellin v. Dretke (2005)

A Texas trial court sentenced Medellin, a Mexican citizen, to death for participating in the gang rape and murder of two girls in 1993. A state appeals court affirmed the conviction. Medellin then filed a state habeas corpus action, claiming that Texas failed to notify him of his right to counsel under the Vienna Convention. The state trial court and the appellate court rejected this claim. Medellin then filed a federal habeas petition, raising the Vienna Convention claim. The district court denied the petition. Medellin next appealed to the Fifth Circuit. Before the Fifth Circuit could rule, the International Court of Justice issued its decision in a case where Mexico had alleged the United States violated the Vienna Convention with respect to Medellin and other Mexican citizens facing the death penalty in the United States. The ICJ held that the United States had violated the individually enforceable rights guaranteed by Vienna and must reconsider the convictions. The Fifth Circuit rejected Medellin's appeal, citing its previous holdings that the Vienna Convention did not create an individually enforceable right. More than two months after the U.S. Supreme Court agreed to hear the case, President George W. Bush issued a memo requiring the United States to follow the ICJ's ruling by having state courts review the Mexicans' cases. Citing the memo and the ICJ ruling, Medellin filed a new appeal in a Texas state court.

Decision: 5 votes for Dretke, 4 vote(s) against
Legal provision:
In a 5-4 per curiam opinion, the Court held that Medellin had not exhausted his state court appeals and sent the case back to Texas state court.

League of Latin American Citizens v. Perry (2006)

In 2003, the Texas State Legislature passed a redistricting plan that replaced the one created by a federal judge following the 2000 census. Critics of the plan charged that it was unconstitutional and violated section 2 the Voting Rights Act because it diluted racial minority voting strength and was designed to maximize partisan advantage. A three-judge district court panel disagreed, finding that the plan was constitutional and that the legislature had the right to redistrict in 2003 using census data from 2000.

The case was appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court, but while it was pending the Court decided Vieth v. Jubelirer, another redistricting case from Pennsylvania. Justice Anthony Kennedy, the deciding vote in that case, wrote that the Court could hear claims of partisan discrimination in redistricting cases, but left open the question of the test those claims would be subjected to.

The three-district panel in this case then affirmed its earlier decision, finding that the Texas redistricting plan was not substantively unfair.

Decision: 5 votes for League of Latin American Citizens, 4 vote(s) against
Legal provision: Voting Rights Act of 1965
The Supreme Court held that the Texas Legislature's redistricting plan did not violate the Constitution, but that part of the plan violated the Voting Rights Act. Justice Anthony Kennedy, writing for a majority of the justices, stated that District 23 had been redrawn in such a way as to deny Latino voters as a group the opportunity to elect a candidate of their choosing, thereby violating the Voting Rights Act. Justice Kennedy also wrote, however, that nothing in the Constitution prevented the state from redrawing its electoral boundaries as many times as it wanted, so long as it did so at least once every ten years.

Smith v. Texas (2007)

LaRoyce Smith was convicted of murder and sentenced to death. In 2004, the Supreme Court overturned his death sentence and sent the case back to state court because of a judge's improper jury instruction. (See Smith v. Texas, No. 04-5323.) Nevertheless, the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals re-imposed the sentence, holding that the erroneous instruction had not done any "egregious harm" to the fairness of Smith's sentencing. The Texas court found that the jury had still been able to consider all relevant mitigating evidence, despite the unconstitutional instruction. The Supreme Court agreed to review the case a second time.

Decision: 5 votes for Smith, 4 vote(s) against
Legal provision:
Unanswered and no. The Court ruled 5-4 that the jury instructions did not give meaningful effect to Smith's mitigating evidence, and that a subsequent corrective instruction was not sufficient to correct the error. The Texas court had ruled that because Smith had abandoned his objection to the instructions in the course of the proceedings, he must show that "egregious harm" had been done to his trial. The Court criticized the Fifth Circuit for misreading the record and the Court's instructions: "The requirement that Smith show egregious harm was predicated, [...] on a misunderstanding of the federal right Smith asserts [...]" Justice Anthony Kennedy wrote the opinion for the majority.

Panetti v. Quarterman (2007)

Scott Louis Panetti was convicted of the murder of his wife's parents and sentenced to death. He petitioned for a writ of habeas corpus in federal District Court, claiming mental illness. The Supreme Court had ruled in Ford v. Wainwright that execution of the mentally ill is barred by the Eighth Amendment's prohibition on cruel and unusual punishment. A psychiatric evaluation found that Panetti believed that the State was "in league with the forces of evil" and was executing him in order to "prevent him from preaching the Gospel." However, doctors also found Panetti to be aware of his crime, of the fact that he was to be executed, and of the State's stated reason for executing him. The District Court concluded that he was sufficiently sane to be executed.

On appeal, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit affirmed the lower court. The Fifth Circuit rejected Panetti's argument that an inmate cannot be executed if he lacks a rational understanding of the State's motivation for the execution. The Court of Appeals instead relied on Justice Lewis Powell's concurrence in Ford, holding that an inmate need only have an awareness of the State's reason for execution, not necessarily a rational understanding of it.

Decision: 5 votes for Panetti, 4 vote(s) against
Legal provision: Amendment 8: Cruel and Unusual Punishment
Unanswered. In an opinion written by Justice Anthony Kennedy for a 5-4 majority, the Court held that the Fifth Circuit's analysis was too restrictive under Ford v. Wainwright, because it treated Panetti's mental condition as irrelevant as long as he had in some sense a factual awareness of the state's rationale. The Court rejected the state's arguments that the Court did not have jurisdiction and that the state court was entitled to deference under the Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996 (AEDPA). In doing so, the Court held that a prisoner may sometimes bring a habeas petition claiming mental incompetency even if he did not raise the claim in his first petition and that state courts can be held to have unreasonably applied a legal principle even if the principle was addressed to somewhat different facts than those of the case at hand. The state court had unreasonably applied Ford by failing to give Panetti a fair hearing to fully present his psychiatric evidence. The Court also ruled that the Fifth Circuit "rests on a flawed interpretation of Ford," because it failed to consider that Panetti's delusions may have prevented him from understanding the meaning of his punishment even though he professed to be aware of the facts. The Court did not undertake its own analysis of what kind of rational understanding the Eighth Amendment requires a death row inmate to have, saying, "Although we reject the standard followed by the Court of Appeals, we do not attempt to set down a rule governing all competency determinations." The Court expressed the hope that expert psychiatric evidence would shed light on which delusions might distort an inmate's sense of reality so much as to render him incompetent to be executed.

Medellin v. Texas (2008)

Jose Medellin, a Mexican national, was convicted and sentenced to death for participating in the gang rape and murder of two teenage girls in Houston. Medellin raised a post-conviction challenge arguing that the state had violated his rights under the Vienna Convention, a treaty to which the United States is a party. Article 36 of the Vienna Convention gives any foreign national detained for a crime the right to contact his consulate. After his petition was ultimately dismissed by the Supreme Court (see Medellin v. Dretke), Medellin's case returned to the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals. Medellin's argument rested in part on a ruling of the International Court of Justice (ICJ) holding that the U.S. had violated the Vienna Convention rights of 51 Mexican nationals (including Medellin) and that their convictions must be reconsidered. Medellin argued that the Vienna Convention granted him an individual right that state courts must respect, a possibility left open by the Supreme Court's 2006 decision in Sanchez-Llamas v. Oregon. Medellin also cited a memorandum from the President of the United States that instructed state courts to comply with the ICJ's rulings by rehearing the cases. Medellin argued that the Constitution gives the President broad power to ensure that treaties are enforced, and that this power extends to the treatment of treaties in state court proceedings.

The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals rejected each of Medellin's arguments and dismissed his petition. The court interpreted Sanchez-Llamas as standing for the principle that rulings of the ICJ are not binding on state courts. The Texas court stood by its position that allowing Medellin to raise the Vienna Convention issue after his trial would violate state procedural rules, and that those rules were not supplanted by the Convention. The President had no authority to order the enforcement in state court of an ICJ ruling, because that would imply a law-making power not allocated to him by the Constitution.

Decision: 6 votes for Texas, 3 vote(s) against
Legal provision: Treaty
The Court upheld the rulings of the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals in a 6-3 opinion written by Chief Justice John G. Roberts. The Court held that the signed Protocol of the Vienna Convention did not make the treaty self- executing and, therefore, the treaty is not binding upon state courts until it is enacted into law by Congress. Furthermore, Chief Justice Roberts characterized the presidential memorandum as an attempt by the executive branch to enforce a non-self executing treaty without the necessary Congressional action, giving it no binding authority on state courts. Justice John Paul Stevens concurred in the opinion and Justice Stephen Breyer, joined by Justices David Souter and Ruth Bader Ginsburg, authored a dissent.

Kennedy v. Louisiana (2008)

A Louisiana court found Patrick Kennedy guilty of raping his eight-year-old stepdaughter. Louisiana law allows the district attorney to seek the death penalty for defendants found guilty of raping children under the age of twelve. The prosecutor sought, and the jury awarded, such a sentence; Kennedy appealed.

The Louisiana Supreme Court affirmed the imposition of the death sentence, noting that although the U.S. Supreme Court had struck down capital punishment for rape of an adult woman in Coker v. Georgia, that ruling did not apply when the victim was a child. Rather the Louisiana high court applied a balancing test set out by the Court in Atkins v. Virginia and Roper v. Simmons, first examining whether there is a national consensus on the punishment and then considering whether the court would find the punishment excessive. In this case, the Louisiana Supreme Court felt that the adoption of similar laws in five other states, coupled with the unique vulnerability of children, justified imposing the death penalty.

In seeking certiorari, Kennedy argued that five states do not constitute a "national consensus" for the purposes of Eighth Amendment analysis, that Coker v. Georgia should apply to all rapes regardless of the age of the victim, and that the law was unfair in its application, singling out black child rapists for death at a significantly higher rate than whites.

Decision: 5 votes for Kennedy, 4 vote(s) against
Legal provision: Amendment 8: Cruel and Unusual Punishment
Yes. In a 5-4 decision the Court held that the Eighth Amendment bars states from imposing the death penalty for the rape of a child where the crime did not result, and was not intended to result, in the child's death. Applying the death penalty in such a case would be an exercise of "cruel and unusual punishment" in violation of a national consensus on the issue. Justice Anthony Kennedy delivered the opinion of the Court. Justice Samuel Alito, joined by Chief Justice John G. Roberts and Justices Clarence Thomas and Antonin Scalia, dissented. In his view, no national consensus existed prohibiting the death penalty in this case, and he vehemently opposed the majority's application of a "blanket rule" barring the death penalty in child rape cases regardless of the facts of the case, including the age of the child, the sadistic nature of the crime, and the number of times the child has been raped.

[close]

Best case:
Global-Tech Appliances v. SEB (2011)

French-based SEB S.A. sells home cooking products in the United States through an indirect subsidiary, T-Fal Corp. SEB owns a patent for a type of deep fryer with an inexpensive plastic outer shell. The improvement of the patent was to separate the shell from the fryer pan to allow for the less expensive material. Hong Kong-based Pentalpha Enterprises, a subsidiary of Global-Tech Appliances, a British Virgin Islands corporation, began selling its deep fryers to Sunbeam Products Inc. in 1997. The company developed the product after purchasing an SEB deep fryer and copying its features. Though Pentalpha solicited and received a "right-to-use study" from a U.S. attorney citing no infringement of any patent, the company had failed to notify the attorney of the copying. SEB filed a lawsuit against Sunbeam and the companies settled. Though Pentalpha was aware of that litigation, it subsequently sold the same deep fryers to Fingerhut Corp. and Montgomery Ward & Co. In 1999, SEB sued Montgomery Ward, Global-Tech, and Pentalpha for infringement in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York, which ruled against Pentalpha. In February 2010, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit affirmed the district court decision and further held that "deliberate indifference" to potential patent rights satisfies the knowledge requirement for induced infringement.

Decision: 8 votes for SEB, 1 vote(s) against
Legal provision: patent infringement, 35 U. S. C. §271(b)
Yes. The Supreme Court affirmed the lower court holding in an opinion by Justice Samuel Alito. "Induced infringement under §271(b) requires knowledge that the induced acts constitute patent infringement," Alito wrote for the majority. Justice Anthony Kennedy dissented, contending that the majority is "incorrect in the definition it now adopts; but even on its own terms the Court should remand to the Court of Appeals to consider in the first instance whether there is sufficient evidence of knowledge to support the jury’s finding of inducement."

Also lol at second case, 14 year sentence for stealing a calculator from Walmart.

[Kara]

Texas state government

[Human Snorenado]

This whole thing is so comical. "Oh yeah, this law isn't to discriminate against gay people!" That's the whole reason the law existed. Admit to it. Own up to your bigotry. You didn't think anyone would really care, because it was just "teh gayz" or whatever. And then you got curb stomped by public opinion, and more importantly by businesses pulling money out of your state. Quit lying, bigots.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/03/31/mike-pence-religious-freedom-law_n_6976912.html

[Joe Molotov]

Stephanopoulos asked Pence point-blank whether the law would let small business owners refuse service to gay couples, and Pence couldn't answer the question. I guess we're expected to believe that all these ultra religious groups came together to support this law because they're super into making sure that medicine men can smoke peyote in their wigwams.

[Brehvolution]

The national backlash is so delicious. I'm glad these fake Christians are getting called out. Like you said, corporations are people my friend, and money > your god.

[Joe Molotov]

From the minds of one of our Greatest Thinkers (he probably just missed the cut at #51) comes the sequel to 2013's smash hit op-ed:

You'll Be Made to Care, Part II: Electric Gaybaloo (Not an April Fools Joke!)

There is no evidence Jesus baked a cake to celebrate sin

Checkmate, liebrals. 

[Joe Molotov]

Joliphant • 4 hours ago
My take was Indiana should sue any business that joins in boycotting Indiana, on the basis of religious discrimination. That said I am not a lawyer and have no idea how practical this would be.

 

[Brehvolution]

The comments section
I hope they do stand and fight for their right to discriminate just to see the smack down that comes from it.

[benjipwns]

[benjipwns]

[Great Rumbler]

(Image removed from quote.)
(Image removed from quote.)

On former Florida Republican Gov. Jeb Bush: "I think he doesn't know who he is. Out of all candidates we've mentioned, I hope he loses."

[Human Snorenado]

GANGSTA

[Phoenix Dark]

get sonned by Pat Buchanan brehs
http://crooksandliars.com/2015/04/watch-pat-buchanan-school-hannity-iran

[Human Snorenado]

Message to Puddles

[Kara]

get sonned by Pat Buchanan brehs
http://crooksandliars.com/2015/04/watch-pat-buchanan-school-hannity-iran

Sean, they’re fighting our enemies. I’d rather have Iranians fighting in Tikrit and dying than American kids there.

Dehumanization, it's not just for Jews now.

[Joe Molotov]

(Image removed from quote.)
(Image removed from quote.)

[benjipwns]

http://www.courant.com/politics/capitol-watch/hc-ct-soldier-demands-apology-from-karl-rove-rove-says-no-apology-needed-for-iraq-war-20150402-story.html

Also:

Also during his address to the audience at UConn, Rove commented on the 2016 presidential campaign, saying he hoped Democratic Sen. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts would enter the race. “We should be so lucky,” he said, calling her “Pocahontas,” a reference to her claims of Native American ancestry.

[benjipwns]

http://www.nationalreview.com/article/416397/liberals-are-new-mccarthyites-and-theyre-proud-it-john-fund

Liberals Are the New McCarthyites—and They’re Proud of It
Harry Reid leads today’s Pitchfork Persecutors.
...
Harry Reid, the top Democrat in the Senate, was asked by CNN’s Dana Bash this week if he regretted his 2012 accusation on the Senate floor that GOP presidential nominee Mitt Romney “hasn’t paid taxes for ten years.” Reid presented no evidence at the time and claimed he didn’t need any: “I don’t think the burden should be on me. The burden should be on him. He’s the one I’ve alleged has not paid any taxes.” Reid’s response in the interview was fascinating. When asked by Bash if his tactic was McCarthyite he visibly shrugged on camera, smiled, and said “Well, they can call it whatever they want. Romney didn’t win, did he?” White House spokesman Josh Earnest refused to criticize Reid for his comment because it “was three years old,” when in reality Reid’s televised reveling in it was only three days old. 

Las Vegas journalist Jon Ralston, who has observed Reid over the latter’s 30-year career in the Senate, has had enough. He revealed that he had written a harshly critical column in 2012 about Reid’s “ruthless, Machiavellian politics” in response to the senator’s accusation against Romney but saw it spiked by the Las Vegas Sun because its editor wanted to protect Reid.

The column pulled no punches in going after Reid: “He doesn’t care about being criticized for using the same tactics that Joe McCarthy used. . . . Is there anything more dangerous than a man who does not care? And a related question: Is there anything more sadly desperate than a party that will do anything not to talk about the economy and to change the subject to Mitt Romney’s wealth? . . . Sometimes the ends do not justify the means, even in the political swamp.” But increasingly the political swamp is being governed by the law of the jungle.

Take the Koch Brothers, who Reid has ceaselessly pilloried as “un-American” in speeches on the Senate floor. And the vilification continues, even with no election in sight. Just this past February, Salon published a piece by Thom Hartmann, America’s leading liberal talk-radio-show host, about the Koch Brothers. The title: “Fascism Is Rising in America.”

Liberals have become quite fond of using fascist imagery to denounce their opponents in some of the same ways conservatives used to warn about Reds under every bed. Al Gore calls his critics “digital brownshirts.” Last month, Vice President Joe Biden accused foes of union power of being “blackshirts.”

And then there are the “naming of names” and economic pressure that seem wildly out of place in a supposedly free marketplace of ideas. Last month, a group of 39 scientists accused the Smithsonian’s Museums of Science and Natural History and the American Museum of Natural History in New York City of compromising their “integrity” by accepting money from the Koch Brothers.

A related petition demanded the Koch Brothers be removed from any museum boards. The scientists claimed that the “only ethical way forward” was for institutions to “cut all ties” with climate-change skeptics and fossil-fuel companies. Syracuse University did just that this week by announcing its full divestment from fossil-fuel companies.

Senator Reid’s Democratic colleagues have joined in the shaming. Senators Barbara Boxer of California, Ed Markey of Massachusetts, and Sheldon Whitehouse of Rhode Island sent a letter in February to over 100 companies and think tanks demanding they reveal their ties to any efforts to argue against climate-change policies.

[Kara]

lol get a fucking grip John Fund.

At least this trip down the well-worn road of liberal handwringing let me remember BRECHT DA GOD's amazing HUAC testimony. Knickerbocker dropped the mic and got on a flight to Helvetica never to return.

[benjipwns]

McCarthy was in the Senate, he had nothing to do with HUAC. G*d, can't you lieberals ever pick up a history book?!?

I recommend these:


They're really heavy, you can flatten all sorts of stuff with them. Prop up tables. Really there's just a ton of things you could do with them.

[Kara]

The Age of Entitlement

[benjipwns]

I didn't know there were three of them until I went to get the pictures, thought there was only two. I have the first one, I got the paperback for $2, it's about as bad of a history book as The People's History in terms of skimming over 80% of events and then really focusing for a huge section on one event or something. Only inverted. I have no idea why people write general histories this way. At least The People's History got a little more focused in the middle.

I was surprised how un-conservative spin it puts on things, it really is just a normal history book that's a bit more pro-America/America can do no wrong than standard ones. I expected like abortion stuff or whatever. I guess there was some extended talk about the founders and guns.

Actually, the best part is that the only elections after 1860 that happen in the book are 1960 (TV debates stole the election!), 1972, 1980 and 1984. Iran-Contra gets like half a page. Really that's how it treats most "bad" things, they get a quick mention or ignored and other stuff is spun so it's like almost everyone supported good things and only a few people supported these bad things.

It was worth maybe $1. 

I think I've seen that Age of Entitlement one at the library. Should force myself to read it.

http://www.amazon.com/review/R129SCD4RQ3QYK/ref=cm_cr_dp_title?ie=UTF8&ASIN=1595231048&nodeID=283155&store=books wow thx
http://www.amazon.com/gp/review/R3EWU99B8Y6UHH/ref=cm_cr_pr_rvw_ttl?ie=UTF8&ASIN=1595230890 even more wow thx

Larry Schweikart, a former rock drummer who opened for "Steppenwolf," is a professor of history at the University of Dayton.

[benjipwns]

Odd-looking post-weightloss Penn Jillette attacks America on CNN by claiming we won't be forced to have gay sex if the Homosexualist Agenda destroys religion:

[Joe Molotov]

What's the point, then?

[Joe Molotov]

http://www.gofundme.com/MemoriesPizza

Is your religion and freedoms only worth $500,000, America? smh, the gay terrorists have won

[ToxicAdam]

Penn looks good to me. Reading more about his weight loss, he went on a strict diet and didn't work out at all. Which is why he might look a bit sickly to some.

The downside to losing lots of weight at an old age is that it exposes all the age in your face. That's one of the reasons William Shatner says he stays fat is because it keeps his face looking young(er). That could just be a quip, but there is truth in it.