gattsuru
2yr ago
gattsuru
2yr ago
Interested in hearing what our resident lawyers have to say about the likelihood of conviction on these charges. How hard would it be to actually prove he was high in the two weeks he had the gun?
I am not a lawyer and this isn't legal advice, but the law isn't about owning a firearm as a drug user, but lying on this form, which asks:
Are you an unlawful user of, or addicted to, marijuana or any depressant, stimulant, narcotic drug, or any other controlled substance?
The ATF's older published rule is that :
Moreover, under the proposed definition, a person must be a current user of a controlled substance to be prohibited by the GCA from acquiring or possessing firearms. Although there is no statutory definition of current use, applicable case law indicates that a person need not have been using drugs at the precise moment that he or she acquired or possessed a firearm to be under firearms disabilities with respect to acquiring or possessing a firearm as an unlawful user of a controlled substance...
The proposed definition is also consistent with the definition of ‘‘current drug user’’ applied by the Department of Labor in its administration of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), 42 U.S.C. §§ 12101–12213. Regulations issued pursuant to the ADA indicate that the term ‘‘current user’’ is not intended to be limited to the use of drugs on a particular day, or within a matter of days or weeks before, but rather that the unlawful use occurred recently enough to indicate that the individual is actively engaged in such conduct.
Similarly, the definition of ‘‘addicted to any controlled substance’’ is based on Federal law, 21 U.S.C. § 802, and defines an ‘‘addict’’ as an individual who uses any narcotic drug and who has lost the power of self- control with respect to the use of the narcotic drug.
More recent guidance is even more explicit:
If there is evidence that an individual admits, within the past 12 months, to using or possessing a controlled substance, the federal drug prohibition 922(g)(3) would apply. Admission of use/possession of a controlled substance may often be found within the narrative of a criminal incident report. An admission of drug use/possession does not have to result in a drug arrest to be disqualifying.
Individuals admitting to illegal use/possession of a controlled substance are prohibited from the receipt/possession of a firearm for one year from the date of admission. It should be noted this must be a self-admission. If a second party states the controlled substance belongs to another subject, either would be disqualified based solely on that statement.
Hunter bought the gun Oct. 12, 2018, and Hallie threw it in the trash Oct. 23, 2018. Hunter's book details on-and-off cocaine use from at least his dismissal from the Navy Reserve until early 2019, but particularly emphasizes 2018 as "I was smoking crack every 15 minutes" after falling off the wagon in spring of that year.
It's not quite a signed confession, but there's few easier cases to prove than when someone literally writes a book about it followed by an interview tour.
gattsuru
2yr ago
Was there deliberate deletion? Seems not
Uh... I'll point to here. At best, Clinton's contractor willfully deleted e-mails three weeks after receiving a document retention request, and her chief of staff issued a deletion policy that violated the Federal Records Act. Which would only be a problem for this unnamed Platte River Networks employee and and Clinton's Chief of Staff. But they weren't prosecuted, either.
gattsuru
2yr ago
At least some mechanisms are 'portable'; for something like sunk costs, one could easily invest in social transition, clothing, make-up, moving to a pro-trans location, so on, without having access to pharmaceutical or surgical transition.
Is there a way I can access the criminal complaint?
Courtlistener for the case is here, complaint and affidavit, though the pretrial detention motion may be helpful as well.
Obvious disclaimer: these are all allegations by the FBI. I'd hope they wouldn't outright lie, but I wouldn't put money on it, and I'd expect that they've excluded anything especially exculpatory from the complaint.
What is the value of these ploys to society?
The FBI alleges that Ventura had made at least some motions common to ISIS fanboys who escalated to violent acts, and plan to travel to join ISIS fighters:
From the complaint affidavit:
On or about August 3, 2021, during the chats exchanged between the OCE and VENTURA, VENTURA explained he had not yet pledged his allegiance to the leader of ISIS. Pledging allegiance is a common way for ISIS supporters to demonstrate their commitment to the group. This is referred to as making “baya” or “bayat”, and typically this pledge is made before any martyrdom operations or acts that are taken on behalf of ISIS so that if the supporter is killed, he supposedly obtains all the rewards from Allah, or God, when he goes to heaven.
On or about January 26, 2023, when asked about hijrah (i.e., traveling to join ISIS), VENTURA stated “I want to give my life for jihad fisabillah [for the sake of Allah] intention is pure from heart,” and also stated that he would “make good fighter for dawla.” As described above, I understand “dawla” to mean ISIS.
On or about January 26, 2023, VENTURA asked the OCE if VENTURA could perform an “ishtishadi” attack. VENTURA further informed the OCE that he wanted to fight for ISIS for a couple of months, but then became a “shashid” (i.e., a martyr) via the ishtishadi operation.
On or about April 9, 2023, The OCE asked Ventura if he would want to participate in an ISIS operation on Eid al-Fitr or go straight to the ISIS training camp. On or about April 10, 2023, VENTURA responded to the OCE "Be party of attack ...." and "Then can send to training camp ....."
In the same conversation, VENTURA told the OCE, “I plan buy ticket for tonight or tomorrow night inshaallah".
On or about April 10, 2023, VENTURA purchased a ticket for a Turkish Airlines flight from Boston with an ultimate destination of Cairo, departing at 11:10pm on April 10, 2023
And from the motion in support of pretrial detention:
The Defendant has shown an obsession with violence – he indicated a desire to commit a suicide attack, attempted to travel to join ISIS to participate in its operations, maintained a cache of over 100 horrifically violent videos, and researched homemade grenades, fertilizer bombs, and how to obtain firearms...
Third, the Defendant is a flight risk. He made at least three attempts to leave the United States and join ISIS. He obtained a passport, credit cards, and airline tickets. He inquired about traveling to Russia to join the Wagner Group of mercenaries in its fight against Ukraine and conducted internet searches about traveling to other European nations.
If this is true, it's likely that the FBI are emphasizing the financial support simply because it's the easiest to get a conviction, but it's not hard to imagine a slightly nuttier kid doing something violent as a result. Of the presented evidence, this might just be within the scope of janky sixteen-year-old 'planning', but it's at least the sort of thing that's easy to talk up how it might be the Next Terror Attack.
Though even the affidavit doesn't push that direction universally. Hussain mentioned the kid "appeared ready to turn in his purported ISIS contact", but the actual behavior was a little dumber:
On or about April 10, 2023, at approximately 10:50pm, the FBI received an electronic tip (E-tip) to the FBI’s National Threat Operations Center (NTOC) from an anonymous source stating the following:
I want 10 million dollars in duffel bags and time to get money in proper places you know who I am you already lost my trust so if you want information on attacks you must pay if you want to save lives and do you’re job this offer here is you’re final chance I want the Cash and Immunity no funny games I known you thought I am retarded fool but jokes on you I will not admit I sent this or communicate until the cash is delivered [FBI AGENT 1] I am speaking to you dumb little bimbo this is my only offer try more offensive actions and you will regret it do what I ask and I will help you simple as this Cash and immunity Cash delivered first 10 mill duffel bags front door no jokes I am not joking or playing funny games you have already lost my trust and this is you’re last chance to fix it text or email me when my demands are accepted then give some days and we can talk in person.We have 1 week or 2 until attacks I have information about happen and much more if do what I tell
On or about April 11, 2023, VENTURA called the FBI Boston Operations Center requesting to speak with someone because he wanted to help with “terror”.
On or about April 12, 2023, at approximately 2:14pm, VENTURA called the FBI Boston Operations Center requesting to speak with FBI AGENT 1 because he had information about urgent incoming terror attacks, but would not provide any further information to the Operations Center Technician.
On or about April 12, 2023, at approximately 3:03pm, VENTURA called the FBI Boston Operations Center requesting to speak with an agent again regarding upcoming terror attacks. VENTURA stated the attacks would take place overseas and would happen in the next 1- 2 weeks. He said the sooner agents call him back, the sooner they can “make the deal”.
On or about April 12, 2023, at approximately 4:43pm, FBI personnel placed a call to VENTURA. On the call, VENTURA stated he had information regarding upcoming mass attacks in Egypt planned by Daesh in Sinai. He stated the attacks were scheduled to take place around the time of Eid al-Fitr. VENTURA also stated that he had information pertaining to ISIS recruiters and individuals who facilitate travel to ISIS.
On or about April 13, 2023, at approximately 7:55am, VENTURA wrote-in an electronic tip (E-tip) to the FBI’s National Threat Operations Center (NTOC) requesting a call back by April 14, 2023. He requested 10 million dollars and immunity in exchange for information he believed would stop an ISIS attack.
This seems less like someone wanting to flip cell leadership, and more someone worried they were getting caught.
I think the FBI's framework is still bullshit. This kid probably flunks the propensity prong for entrapment as a legal matter, because most people aren't going to spend a whole bunch of time trying to find ways to join ISIS and then toy with flying to Cairo. The FBI's handler (says that they) very carefully simply prompted the kid about things he could do, rather than telling him to do them; a genuine terrorist recruiter could probably have been more direct.
But at the same time, it's difficult to understand what's better served doing a severe prosecution, rather than calling the kid's parents early on and having them pull his internet access — even assuming he would have been as easily manipulated by an actual terrorist, that’d still keep him out of their reaches. Maybe that's what would have happened if he didn't try the ETip fuckery, but we don't really have insight for that.
What is the value of these ploys to the FBI? Going off tropes, more crimes = more funding more power and more reputation. If that's the case I want more concrete and detailed pathways.
The FBI has made very overt claims that ISIS-specific stochiastic terrorism justifies or requires special powers or legislation, and it's one of the few remaining places that Red and Blue Tribe normies continue to trust the FBI. I think the focus is more specific than the general Gotta Keep Numbers Up.
gattsuru
2yr ago
If people don't think the impact on bone health is a big deal, just list it as one of the possible effects, explain why you think it's not important, and move on. Don't gaslight parents into thinking there's no permanent changes, and immediately flip to "well, ok, but that one's not so important" as soon as someone points to a permanent change.
Yeah, that's fair, and there's certainly some people who make the position dishonestly. I do think there's at least some who had people skeptical of puberty blockers bring the matter up, went by either a gut check or relayed information, and then had that response to further concerns, rather than going to full "it's happening and it's good".
Also, I can just buy milk for my kids.
Ehh.... federal policy has strictly limited the types available for sale or purchase in schools (that accept federal funds, or are in New York) to types that are less palatable to most people.
I did hear a plausible mechanism for how it could happen (puberty being one of the things that resolves dysphoria for a lot of kids), but somehow my first thought on it is that's it's just the sunk cost fallacy, rather than something inherent to blockers.
I think there's a lot of reasons to contest the proposed methodology, and the available data is so small and so time- and space-sensitive that it's definitely not strong evidence in any direction, so that's fair.
gattsuru
2yr ago
Yeah, delayed puberty as a category has long been believed to have only small impact on height and bone density. It's not clear how true that was -- constitutional delayed puberty does seem to correlate with a difference in height, it's just a question how much of that from the puberty itself as from family history... but the family history often includes delayed puberty -- and puberty blockers have further ramifications that could have results not present in conventional delayed puberty (although the only good evidence I've seen is from much larger doses than used for blocking puberty in trans kids).
That isn't to say that it's obviously true, or even likely true, but it's not self-evidently wrong from any knowledge of the topic.
That said, I think bone density is a pretty big distraction from the underlying questions: we're not having knock-down drag out fights over bad federal school milk policy, even though that impacts more students and probably manages to be even dumber. The soc con objection is that children on puberty blockers are far more likely to continue to identify as trans into adulthood, which there's pretty strong evidence in favor of, and, more controversially, that people who were on puberty blockers pre-transition may have long-term sexual issues in either their birth-assigned or transitioned genders into adulthood. These are going to have entirely unrelated answers.
gattsuru
2yr ago
Apologies, should have been more clear. I think my point is less about a distinction between "preference" and "interference", and more that when putting all of these conditions on an "interference" scale, the proposed solutions of physical modification are clearly non-functional and sometimes even non-survivable for muscle dysphoria and anorexia, partly because of the common-mode behaviors, and partly because of underlying physical limitations to the human body and current medical science.
gattsuru
2yr ago
Even to the extent that someone might have encountered a trans person in their lives pre-2010, it was fairly uncommon to know they were trans, especially if you weren't good at clocking people. The framework of this as equivalent to the Witness Protection Program -- completely cutting ties with one's past life and community, moving across the country -- isn't exactly what was going on, but it was present enough to get pushback as recent as 2009. Transitioning-in-place was much less common, especially in rural and suburban areas, due to the relative difficulty of medical practitioners doing these services, the physical difficulties involved in many of them, and a variety of economic pressures.
It's probably also worth mentioning the vastly increased prominence of transmen qua transmen. The relative paucity of them as a group sometimes reflected data gathering problems -- most studies depended on that required legal name changes and/or bottom surgery that remain less common among transmen even today -- but it was pretty common for people, even people much into the broader queer or gender-nonconforming world, to not really have consideration of the category as a possible thing until the late-00s, barring very specific communities.
gattsuru
2yr ago
Yeah, apologies, should have spelled that out. The movie is based on a book published in 1989, which itself claims it was 'inspired by' a case that John Grisham had seen in 1984, though very few details or even broad strokes actually matched.
Was 1996 Alabama really THAT racist? Would the random average white person in Alabama at that time be considered racist enough by default that they would automatically side against any black defendant? Were there enough real, true, hardcore racists that the KKK could field 100+ protesters at a big racial trial?
I'm not sure that the movie is supposed to be set in 1996: the jury selection in particular only really makes sense either before Batson or in an alternate universe where it never happened.
That said, while the KKK (or connected actual-fascist networks) had lost much of their ability to bring out attendees by the mid-90s, one of the bigger offshoot's national headquarters was in Tuscarolla Alabama until they lost it in a court case in the late 1980s, and they could get 50+ members to a Northern rally as late as 1997.
If it's intended to be in the mid-1980s, it probably is trying to draw comparisons more akin to 1987, where 400 and 1000 "counterprotesters" (not all KKK, but enough to start violent fights). The aftermath of the civil suits from that era was a lot of what broke what little institutional support and administrative power remained for the KKK and other related groups.
I don't have great info on whether 1990s or 1980s white jurors would necessarily side against an African-American man regardless of the evidence in Alabama -- it's kinda overlooked but Batson did actually plea guilty and probably did do the thefts in that case -- but in a case like this one where the defendant unquestionably committed the acts I think the question of sympathy would be more relevant. (Though I am pretty skeptical that the jurors would have been as blatantly racist: it's also notable that in the original book, the "now imagine she's white" came from a juror. While Grisham made the whole story up wholesale that's what he believed what plausible for 1984.)
How differently, if at all, would such a trial be perceived today?
Preeettty heavily.
What is a proper punishment for the father, if any?
The ricochet on the police officer would be pretty conventional assault in the first degree in Alabama, a Class B Felony. There's not much specific sentencing guidelines for Alabama, but "Not less than two (2) years and not more than twenty (20) years imprisonment in the state penitentiary, including hard labor and may include a fine not to exceed $30,000." seems like a reasonable band. Given the severity of the injury (the officer loses a leg) and its forseability (the shooter had no backstop, in a crowded environment), I'd error on the higher side, but the victim's forgiveness makes me hesitant to say the highest side.
For the rapists... I've spoken about the risks of "needed killing" being a meaningful defense, but the flip side of that is that some people... well, I would be quite happy if they repent their ways and work the rest of their lives to try to pay for the evil they've done... but I'm not optimistic. I'd prefer clean cases of self-defense or defense-of-others, more significantly because they protect victims, but also for philosophical reasons. But I'm hard-pressed to believe it'd be possible for the father in this situation to have done something wrong, rather than merely not maximally laudable.
The flip side is that one of the serious dangers to vigilantism is getting it wrong. It's easy in a movie, where we 'know' what happened at the crime, but that's not how the world works. And homicide doesn't have a statute of limitations. This combination has some bad policy ramifications -- it's 'better' to try and find not-guilty a good man, and worse to try a case that risks having jeopardy attach before information shakes loose -- but I'm not sure there's a better one.
gattsuru
2yr ago
The second framework (the one eschewing the gender identity component) would not dismiss the individual’s concerns and would be part of a panoply of well-established phenomena of individuals inconsolably distressed with their body, such as body integrity dysphoria (BID), anorexia, or muscle dysphoria. The general remedies here tend to be a combination of counseling and medication to deal with the distress directly, and only in rare circumstances is permanent alteration even considered. I imagine there is some consternation that I’ve compared gender dysphoria with BID, but I see no reason to believe they are qualitatively different and welcome anyone to demonstrate otherwise.
It's... probably worth bringing up the shrink's viewpoint on this matter, since I think there's a meaningful difference here. I don't have huge insight for the sort of people who write or read the DSM at length, but from my understanding the point of the framework isn't to measure whether people have certain traits and slot them into a diagnosis, but to determine whether those traits are interfering with normal functioning at life, work, social behavior, and health.
This is most obvious with anorexia: this condition is not determined by merely being afraid of gaining weight or wanting a merely below-normal weight, but that the client has severe enough issues that this results in significant interference with normal functioning. Muscle dysphorics are not merely people who want to bulk up, but instead put wide swathes of their life as second in importance. And, in most cases of muscle dysphoria and anorexia, there's never really 'enough', at least at a level a human can survive; those who are relatively healthy tend to be so only due to outside pressures they can't avoid. Assisting one of these individuals to achieve their target physiology isn't really a solution that reduces interference with normal functioning.
((Though the classical form of BID, as auto-amputation-focused, is an exception on both counts: there's at least some anecdotal evidence of BID sufferers not relapsing with a new fixation after their desired amputation, and having moderately reasonable functioning outside of the missing arm or leg. Though it's not clear how true these anecdotes are, and the more you get away from simple amputation the less good the evidence gets. Stalking Cat is sometimes discussed as an unusual BID case, and I'll defend him as being oppressed by the FDA, but if you consider him in that framework he very clearly wasn't going to ever be done in any modern tech.))
Where gender identity disorder falls here is controversial, to say the least. Social conservatives often point to low rates of satisfaction and happiness and high rates of suicidal ideation or regret after surgery or transition, while trans advocates point to the exact reverse, and the whole matter just seems to me like another reason to be suspicious of any significant poll- or poll-like data. Even under that, there are serious value questions about the relative importance of reproductive capability (or, say, the increased ovarian cancer risks from testosterone supplementation) against suicide rates (or, say, the health downsides of having intact gonads, for a real fun philosophical question).
But these are ultimately questions of fact, that could at least in theory be discussed and analyzed on that metric even if no one seems to have both the ability and interest in doing so seriously.
gattsuru
2yr ago
I'm not really make the moral argument, here; I'm open to the possibility that Clinton's behavior was less morally bad, though I'm not convinced of it.
My objection is that a lot of the behavior in Clinton's case absolutely was the sort of thing that looked like an absolute clownshow. Not having the number of boxes of documents that they originally claimed is one of the more overt, but it wasn't exactly a one-off. Clinton had asked people to strip classification markings off messages and then send them on unsecured networks, responded to requests to turn over all her e-mails by giving tiny subsections and deleting others.
Some of that's not Clinton confessing to all the elements of a criminal offense on tape -- the Platte River Networks employee who told the FBI that he or she knew of a preservation order from the Benghazi Committee, and knew that it applied to materials he or she was deleting, at the time he or she actually did the deleting; Cheryl Mills testified to all the elements for an obstruction of justice charge if anyone no one considered that as relevant then -- but they weren't prosecuted, either.
That's not exactly unique, either. I've given my rants about absolute abominations of behavior across the political aisles that's been overlooked out of misplaced les majestie, but it's actually pretty common for them to be embarrassingly tedious in addition to also often being grotesque.
There's perhaps a fair argument that Trump is more clownshow, perhaps more clownshow than anyone else ever has been. I'm actually pretty willing to support that, with my only remaining reservations because I'm familiar with some very stupid political scandals. And this argument continues that either Clinton was above some arbitrary threshold of embarrassingly bad cover, or hit the magic level of distribution of clownshoery that no one person could be proven guilty or even indicted, even by standards that allow prosecutors to suborn perjury or indict a ham sandwich.
But then this argument further needs some reason to respect that particular distinction. And it's a pretty narrow band to dial in on.
I and HalloweenSnarry have used it, referencing in part a Kontextmaschine tumblr post from 2015. I want to say there were some references back in the Web2.0 fora era (maybe 2010-2012ish?), but if so I don't know if any records have survived; it was well before I began my archiving binge.
Definitely obscure, and a lot of the things that drove it as a category (the Moral Majority and more controlled focuses from the progressive branch, most obviously), though the underlying trends are pretty common if you look for them.
gattsuru
2yr ago
I don't know that he's (unusually) corrupt, and I doubt most political corruption goes from blue states into deep red ones.
I just don't think corruption is the only or even most available avenue for political indictments. Make a false statement during online fundraising? (State) wire fraud statutes could be written expansively enough to cover anything close to them. Harass a business in another state? Many states, especially southern states, have laws against deprivation and attempted deprivation of right under color of law; these are mostly civil for now, but that's mostly so they're available for private rights of action (and for lower standards of proof) rather than some deep requirement. There's some 11th Amendment complexities, here, but they largely reflect needing to pursue state officials as individuals rather than states themselves -- but if your intent is to harass rather than to get an injunction, that's kinda besides the point.
This isn't something states do, right now; there's a reason that all the handwringing about DeSantis kidnapping charges didn't have people bringing up a potential constitutional crisis. And there's very good reasons that they don't! But it's a weapon on the table.
gattsuru
2yr ago
I think Gillum and McDonnell cases are lower-hanging fruit from a rhetorical perspective, in that it's pretty clear that they did the things, that the behavior was intended to fall in the bounds of the law, and it's mostly a matter of whether they had sufficient cutouts (for Gillum) or where the law was written specifically enough to cover the bad behavior (McDonnell). BridgeGate is more difficult, since the behavior by Kelly and Baroni were definitely Bad Things, and they should be illegal, but the wire fraud statute was a really stupid approach to try and go after them.
There's a lot of stuff like this, and it's far broader (and often worse!) than mere corruption.
I just don't think, given the available evidence, that Stevens was in that set. The law clearly prohibited what he was alleged to have done -- there's a reason he and the Bridge to Nowhere were a staple reference from the (GOP-leaning!) Porkbusters set until the second shoe dropped -- it's just that the government had very strong reasons to believe that he didn't do those things.
gattsuru
2yr ago
As you said, we don't know if it was someone on Clinton's staff who did the wiping, and it would have been very difficult to prove in court.
We... do know, or at least the FBI does (the specific names were blocked out in FOIAs). The Benghazi Committee's first request for all relevant Clinton e-mails was sent November 18, 2014. In December 2014, Clinton Chief of Staff Cheryl Mills asked Platte River Networks to delete all e-mail information older than 60 days. This policy change was not implemented at this time. The Benghazi Committee sent out preservation requests to Clinton and to Platte River Networks on March 4th, 2015. Sometime between March 25th and the 31st, 2015, a Platte River employee used BleachBit to overwrite all Clinton e-mails, and that employee knew of the preservation request and that it covered this company and these files.
Platte River would also go out of its way to resist complying with or even recognizing a congressional subpeona.
Which doesn't necessarily say anything for Clinton herself, and maybe not even Mills. Well, Mills' original order was still violating the Federal Records Act, and the initial November 18 request is the sort of thing that traditionally is considered a preservation request, and the whole thing made Clinton's claims that she'd provided all relevant e-mails to the committee a farce.
But that Platte River Networks employee was never charged, or even seriously investigated. So it seems less found "very difficult" and more just untried.
gattsuru
2yr ago
Naively, there's a chance people will recognize the tooling; politics is at least theoretically anti-inductive. To an extent, this is currently one of Trump's biggest selling points, damning with faint praise as that might be. Given past events, I'm not that optimistic.
More pessimistically... there was a case in the late 90s where a federal agent shot an unarmed woman holding a baby. That case was somewhat complicated over past Supremacy Clause questions over where a federal officer's official processes start and where reasonable behavior ends. But states do not have to limit themselves to good, fair, or honest laws, that a federal employee might only violate when taking their duty to its most extreme edges.
States just don't do that, and that's why you've not heard much about the few cases that even started. And the feds can put the pressures in; the Clinton-era fed put a lot of pressure to get Lon Horuchi's prosecutor limited as much as possible. It's even possible that federal judges will quickly develop new immunities or theories of impossible requirements of standing. But taking it off the table entirely as a threat requires taking every state, not just the federal gov.
gattsuru
2yr ago
I think that's the end result of what's happening now -- if someone isn't willing to indict Biden (and/or Newsom, and whatever) in the next six years, grassroots Republicans will find someone nutty enough to do so, whether or not the law supports that particular matter. It's possible that this turns out to be a sword that doesn't cut both ways, but if so, they're going to go up a rung and chop out sections of the FBI or DoJ until it happens. There's ways you can separate each and every other big-wig politician or politically-connected actor who violated the law and got off scot free, but there's few ways to do so and not seem post-hoc justifications -- and it's far too dangerous a tool to be only available to one team.
And I think that would mollify conservatives, if not necessarily as many Trumpists.
Of course, the flip side is that it'd be extraordinarily bad on its own merits. Even the steelman of 'just' going after 'genuine' cases will result in federal officials facing a barrage of 1983 suits, but conservatives have fifteen or twenty years of genuine or imagined overlooked misbehavior to bring forward.
gattsuru
2yr ago
My point isn't that the prosecutors were Bad People, though I think they were. My bigger objection is that Stevens quite probably was innocent, and more likely than not well in compliance with the spirit of the law, rather than skirting on the edges. Even presuming that the appropriate level of prosecutor misconduct or prosecution of a marginal case isn't zero, it seems like there's a lot more low-hanging fruit than one where suborned perjury resulted in an innocent man being found guilty.
gattsuru
2yr ago
Ted Stevens is an awkward example, because there's a lot of pretty good evidence that he didn't do it: the prosecution's case depended on the claim a contractor was underbilling him, and that contractor said in an interview with the FBI (concealed from the defense) that work was worth at most a third of the government's estimate, that the whole house wasn't worth the government's estimate, and that the contractor had refused to send bills to Stevens when Stevens had asked, while prosecutors either stood by without correcting or suborned perjury.
Yeah, I really have to second this. Even presuming Clinton's lawyers and strategy was better then Trump -- not exactly a given! -- that's still damning with incredibly faint praise. It's the sort of thing where a Trump defender could claim 'hey, he wasn't caught literally stuffing them into his pants'.
There's a pathway where everyone decides that, contra 2016's handwringing, "lock X up" is now acceptable discourse and the current President's arguments in favor of rolling back to normalcy don't cover this. But it's not like jeopardy attached for Clinton, or has attached yet for Biden or Bush or countless other oopsies.
gattsuru
2yr ago
Do I understand correctly that the main point is that you expect number of same-sex relationships to grow faster than linearly with proportion of bisexuals?
Yeah, pretty much, modulo perhaps some time offset with some hysteresis.
And I feel bad to ask for even more elaboration after such a reply, but I was most interested in something you only just touched on: “a massive potential for changes in a lot of norms, both in single-sex and mixed-sex environments,” what have such changes been in the communities you know?
It's... kinda tricky to summarize, and I'm not sure how much each change will generalize.
As a trivial example of the limits of trying to extrapolate, all three of the furry fandom and FFXIV and pre-porn ban tumblr, for example, have developed a pretty wide tolerance for 'mild' 'queer' or 'feminine' sexuality, as have some other smaller communities, not just in the mainstream sense of not being offended by its existence, but actively accepting its presence in a lot of more semi-public adult-specific spaces. That's not (just) sex or porn or lewd jokes, but the sort of conversations that pop up, even for het couples in the sphere, and how they're acceptable to make pretty public. It's not universal, but it's a very noticeable contrast from post-1990s conventions through a number of cultures that really strongly discourage even the het variants.
Some of this is probably just the possibility of male-male, female-female, or other romance, but another probably a more complicated bit where social opprobrium has driven a lot of contested behavior and a lot of bad actors out from public awareness so the normal social norms against being too flirty haven't (or don't) apply. I think in the longer term a lot of this doesn't end up surviving in its current form into day-to-day life, especially workplaces -- when it comes to queer-as-in-gay versus the administrative class, the HR sphere probably wins, even and maybe especially when it restricts subaltern groups -- but there's probably going to be some variant around.
Or... so, the expectations that gay-area gyms are rolling orgies isn't right, but I don't think it's realistic (or even possible!) to expect androphillic attraction to completely disappear as soon as someone steps into the public sphere. In practice, most areas I've seen with a lot of gay or bisexual guys always end up having a lot more romantic overtures happening in spaces that aren't gay bars or online dating, both because it stops being a minefield with only mines, and because getting an incompatible overture stops meaning anything other than a complement. This dynamic something I've seen pop up in as small groups as college clubs.
Okay, well, changes in sexuality affect sexual behavior and dating norms, that's not a huge surprise. But there's a lot of things downstream of that.
Some gay or lesbian couples adopt kids or make other arrangements, but it's not as common as straight couples doing making kids and even when it does happen it has a pretty different set of pathways -- not always later, but often later. I'm kinda hoping this trend doesn't continue or even reverses, but a lot of very-gay and very-lesbian spaces are extremely DINK, in a pretty wide variety of ways. That impacts everything from scheduling (late nights suck a lot more when you've got to get kids to the bus stop by 7am) to expectations around non-sobriety (hangovers are a lot rougher when the kids are waking you up at 7am) to availability of large time blocks (it's a lot harder to support a five-day event, even a completely kid-focused one, if you have your own kids to work around). These aren't always or even often bad; my own nature has made it a lot more possible to support a number of STEM outreach programs that have needed a lot of manpower on short notice. But it's a difference.
And more controversially... for most people, relationships are the single biggest way that they let another person into their lives after leaving home. Yes, there are the people who are actually roommates and deal with 99% of the same stuff that couples who were oh my good roommates might, but most of that is a lot closer to 'tolerate' at best. You pick up norms and expectations, and in turn so does your partner. And to some extent, there are a lot of gendered norms and expectations that get tempered in our society by being forced to deal with their counterparts. A lot of gay guys historically have had other IRL exposures to women that a lot of straight men didn't, hence a lot of the flouncy stereotypes, but that's going to be less and less present.
Is ruaidri even a single person? The way he puts out both detailed 3d animation and high quality drawings at a steady pace, he's either several people or a true Renaissance man of furry porn.
I don't know. There are a few 'artists' that are collaborative works, either openly (Blotch, MrSafetyLion) or less so, but I've not seen any evidence of it for ruaidri specifically. He presents as a single person in a way that would take a lot of effort to fake, at least, but I don't think he has a major presence in convention circuits.
He's far from the only multi-disciplinary furry artist, including a number that are pretty good at what they do: compare ToykoZilla (dragons in 2d digital media, does a lot of VRchat avatars, sfw), pre-burnout Fek (bi trending gay, some mild bdsm, drawing, 3d models, and did programming for the solo projects RACK/RACK2), accelo (about as gay as it can get for media sometimes involving women, mostly digital art, some 3d modeling for resin-scale printing, /very/ NSFW). Even for the list of straight furries, Eddiew's not particularly happy about his artwork or writing, but he does both reasonably well by my standards and has been at a good pace for over a decade. And there's a lot of other people with stranger focuses in skillsets or content focuses: see SixthLeafClover for a (mostly SFW) artist that's branched out to collectables, and there's a handful of artists that are also general aviation pilots. Not every furry creator is a Renaissance man (or woman, or whatever), but there are a lot.
But ruaidri does have an amazing tempo; I could see that, combined with the lack of other social media presence, as a plausible explanation. But it's very weak evidence if so.
gattsuru
2yr ago
Even now, the hand of the state doesn't cover all of America; where I grew up it's barely felt and I think that's true for much of small town, rural America - who's really gonna snitch on their neighbors over building ordinances?
People absolutely snitch on their neighbors over building ordinances. (for bonus points, places attempting to limit anonymous tips have often found themselves facing ACLU opposition), across a wide variety of locations and cultures and jurisdictions.
((For even more fun, it's not just a matter of getting the permit; it's quite possible to get a wholly-correct assembly together, and then have code enforcement decide to call you out years later for a final inspection asking to see things literally buried under feet of dirt.))
They're not even always wrong to do snitch! If someone's laying a hilariously bad electrical fire risk, or pouring 90psi of water at your front door, or propping up a giant hammer with a little piece of string aimed at your property, there's no magic ward at the edge of your property.
But it's often not about that. And short of finding places where the law doesn't touch at all, or having such a large remove from other parcels that there's no one to report, it's just something that comes with home ownership. And this isn't specific to building ordinances.
There is a small industry of ADA testers that will find any business that doesn't meet their standards, even if they didn't intend to actually buy that businesses's products or services. There's EPA and Army Engineers if you want to build on a wide variety of parcels -- and even if you think your land isn't covered, the right advice right now is to get them to actually give you that in writing instead. And this is just the easy universal stuff! God forbid you do something dangerous like deal with chemicals, or firearms, or anything financial. There's thousands of these things.
Hunter published a book in 2019, writing that he was "I was smoking crack every 15 minutes" during the middle of 2018 up til early 2019. And then followed up with a set of publicity interviews repeating the same matters. He submitted the paperwork for October 12th, 2018, and the ATF has taken the position that using or possessing within the past twelve months triggers this law.
So, no, this is about as slam-dunk a case as this particular matter gets, and that's before all of the photographic evidence from the Laptop That Wasn't.
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