zataomm
8mo ago
From the indictment:
COUNT 11 of 41
And the Grand Jurors aforesaid, in the name and behalf ofthe citizens of Georgia, do charge and accuse DONALD JOHN TRUMP [et al.], [...] unlawfully conspired, with the intent to defraud, to knowingly make a document titled "CERTIFICATE OF THE VOTES OF THE 2020 ELECTORS FROM GEORGIA," [...] insuch manner that the writing as made purports to have been made by authority ofthe duly elected and qualified presidential electors from the State of Georgia, who did not give such authority
Read the above and recall that what AshLael wants anyone still reading this to believe is that for the purposes of the Georgia indictment, it makes no difference whether in creating the alternative slate of electors (aka "fake electors"), the accused parties intended for the "CERTIFICATE OF THE VOTES" to deceive Congress into wrongly counting Georgia's votes for Donald Trump.
To echo a favorite line of mine, I cannot imagine an interpretation of the phrase "with the intent to defraud," or really the entire context and meaning of Count 11 and several other counts like it, that would make AshLael's position reasonable.
Whether the intent of the "fake elector" document was to deceive Congress matters to the legal case. Of course it matters. Anyone who says differently either hasn't read the indictment or is a troll.
zataomm
8mo ago
The first person to use the word fraud (without de-) was you. You stated that you didn’t think deception was an element. I commented that fraud would seem to always involve deception. That’s why it’s relevant.
I’ll ask you once again to consider the method by which Trump stole the relevant voter data. It involved lying. A lot. Do you think Trump would have been charged with theft if his claims about the election had been true? The indictment sure makes it seem like the fact he was lying is relevant.
Also, stepping back for a second, there are so many counts in the indictment related to forgery, false documents, and false statements, I don’t know how you managed to start a debate over the one count that (arguably, in your opinion) doesn’t involve deception.
zataomm
8mo ago
I can't imagine a definition of fraud that wouldn't involve some kind of deception. Merriam-Webster:
1a : DECEIT, TRICKERY
specifically : intentional perversion of truth in order to induce another to part with something of value or to surrender a legal right
zataomm
3mo ago
Horrifying. Context makes it a little better but definitely bad to imply any kind of debt owed to Trump by any of the justices. Not sure who Alina Habba is exactly though, she’s not one of the lawyers whose name appears on Trump’s petition to the court, all of whom surely want to kill her right about now.
zataomm
4mo ago
Yes, I agree with your assessment of Gorsuch and Roberts, which is why if they do agree I could pre-commit to following whatever they say as both wise and respectful of the relevant laws as written. Not sure what I'd do if they disagree but again I think you're right, Gorsuch is more likely to apply the law with strict correctness while Roberts will look for the decision that is best for the political system overall. My heart is with Gorsuch but I think I'd have to go with my head and favor Roberts.
zataomm
4mo ago
Looking at the IRS IRA required minimum distribution (RMD) table, at age 80 you are required to withdraw 5% from your 401k, and the percentage goes up each year after that. At age 75 your withdrawal already exceeds 4%. You don't have to spend it, but you do have to take it as income and pay taxes on it.
zataomm
4mo ago
To not clog up top comments, I'm deleting this and and putting it in a new thread which hopefully will be of interest to somebody. Colorado Supreme Court thread
zataomm
3mo ago
Trump has filed his petition to the Supreme Court asking them to review the Colorado decision. Lawyers writing briefs don't generally have the same opportunity for snark as judges when they write their opinions, so my favorite quote was:
constitutional speech protections should not turn on opinions from sociology professors
Which seems reasonable to me.
The brief contains a variety of arguments, some of which are stronger than others. One interesting argument I hadn't heard before is that while someone may be disqualified from holding office, they are still permitted to run for office. A bit hard to swallow in the case of a candidate counting on Congress to "remove the disability" after he gets elected to office, but, like I said, interesting.
The brief points out some deficiencies specific to the Colorado proceedings. Candidates are required to file a paper affirming that they meet the qualifications to be President, but the Colorado Secretary of State is not required to independently investigate this affirmation, and thus had no business doing so. A good point, but by now we have challenges across several states, so the Supreme Court is going to need to go bigger to resolve this issue.
The brief argues that the events of Jan. 6 were not an "insurrection", and even if it was, Trump did not "engage" in the insurrection. I agree with this, but my instinct is that the Supreme Court is not going to want to go so far as to make that determination.
The Supreme Court's two main options are unpalatable. They can:
- Point out deficiencies specific to the Colorado procedure
- Take up the case of Trump's eligibility themselves
The first doesn't go far enough, and won't resolve other states' cases, while the second goes too far, taking on more responsibility than the Supreme Court likes to have. For this reason, my expected outcome is for the Supreme Court to lean on section 5 of the 14th Amendment, saying that Congress and only Congress is able to determine eligibility for federal office. As @AshLael has pointed out, this is standard operating procedure for Roberts, he loves to write opinions which conclude by saying, in effect, "if Congress doesn't like this outcome, they are free to pass a new law to achieve the outcome they like."
zataomm
4mo ago
zataomm
8mo ago
Attempted crimes should be punished, but the details of why the "attempt" failed are relevant to determining whether it was a genuine attempt at all. In your attempted murder analogy, yes, you couldn't shoot me because your gun jammed, but if prior to that attempt you purposely manipulated the gun by jamming up the chamber so that a spent round would get stuck in there and be impossible to eject, that would be evidence that you never intended your "murder attempt" to be effective.
The fact that Congress wasn't fooled doesn't by itself make election fraud not a crime, but the fact that apparently Trump tried this maneuver in several states and in no cases were the "fake elector" votes counted, indicates that there is something suspicious about the narrative that he was trying to deceive Congress. Yes, they sent a piece of paper to Congress saying they were the duly-chosen electors and they were voting for Trump etc., but that paper was presented as what it was, an alternate slate of electors. At no point was Pence saying, "well, now I have no idea which ones are the real votes!"
zataomm
11mo ago
There seems to be some currency weirdness in Albania, like you can't bring Albanian hard currency out of the country? Do you happen to know whether the exchange rate at ATMs is fair or do you have to bring a bunch of Euros/Dollars and exchange them on the street?
zataomm
1yr ago
Gotta admit I'm not about to read all that API documentation for window.showOpenFilePicker() but it looks like the user has to have a lot more specific interaction, i.e. choosing files on local disk, in order for the site to have access. So you wouldn't be able to get access just using some generic popup.
zataomm
1yr ago
Aren't your question parameters too wide? If someone has a perfect (presumably zero day) exploit
I suppose so. If somehow Chrome granted a page access to the entire filesystem, obviously that would be very bad. But you're probably protected against such an exploit because come on, are you really going to be the first person they target with this attack? Although I retract this skepticism if you are actually a billionaire.
So okay, are they any known ways that a site could extract important private information about a user just by visiting a site (and, let's say, scrolling)?
zataomm
4mo ago
Yeah, weird. Mod intervention or bug? Definitely a bug in the sense it was not “deleted by user” (me)
zataomm
4mo ago
There are Federal crimes related to slavery though: 18 U.S. Code § 1583 - Enticement into slavery. This is more than just a gotcha; we're talking about punishments here, and I don't really see how the 13th amendment can be self-executing with regard to charging, trying, and punishing an individual for holding someone else in involuntary servitude. So if we imagine a case where a slave sued his enslaver who held him in bondage after 1865, sure, the court would rule that the slave could no longer be held, but without further legislation, they couldn't really specify a punishment for the slave holder. Presumably the slaveholder could then be sued in civil court for damages by his slave. I think in that case the 13th amendment would prevent the slaveholder from using "this man is my slave" as a defense.
Getting kind of far afield here, but the overall point is that the difference between sword and shield actually is important; if the Constitution establishes a specific punishment, then it makes sense to believe that it is up to Congress to establish a procedure for determining to whom that punishment should be applied.
On the other hand, I don't have much to say in response to your point about Jefferson Davis. It's a good point.
zataomm
4mo ago
Having now read the dissent by Samour I actually do think this is a slam dunk argument.
a sign saying "visiting hours 3-5 pm" at a hospital, from which we can glean that visiting isn't allowed outside this window
Apparently there is some debate about this, with many internet sources supporting your interpretation, but this is not how I understand the phrase "the exception proves the rule." Your example about limited hours (at a hospital, or parking) is commonly used but I don't really think it demonstrates the true meaning of the phrase. My perspective is, as long as people keep visiting the hospital between 3-5 pm, we can't really know what would happen if someone visits outside those hours. Maybe it is really enforced, or maybe the sign is like those vestigial "Please maintain 2 meter distance" signs we see everywhere nowadays, and nobody really cares.
So the way we really prove (in the sense of to test, as in "the proof of the pudding is in the eating) is when a visitor shows up at the hospital at 6pm. If they are turned away, then there really is a rule that nobody can visit outside the hours of 3-5 pm. If they are let in, there is no such rule. So in other words, it's not the sign, but the attempted visit outside "visiting hours," that proves the rule.
Edit: For transparency, the Wikipedia article which I indirectly referenced here thinks I'm engaging in wishful thinking about what I think the phrase should mean, rather than its actual origin. Which.... may be a fair criticism.
zataomm
5mo ago
You're right that whether I feel sad is not the point of this discussion. The fact that it has generated several replies should indicate to you that people think there is something interesting to be discussed, and it is not my sadness. Here are the bullet points of what we are talking about:
- public policy decisions are made as a function of public discourse
- a significant(?) number of people are unable to have rational discussions, i.e. weigh the pros and cons, of matters of public policy importance
- this situation as described leads to bad public policy decisions which are difficult to correct
I actually don't think I understand your point overall but it feels like your point is we can't rationally prove that pain and suffering are bad, so checkmate rationalists, we're no better than anyone else. Which... okay.
zataomm
5mo ago
Frankly, I think this is a terrible theory of mind.
Well... I disagree that it is a terrible theory of mind. In line with the main theme of this discussion, people just don't tend to think very deeply about most issues. And I don't believe that the average person who supports, say, rent control laws, understands the economic argument against them but still supports them because they have a different moral philosophy from economists, even though I agree that in theory there could be such a person with such a philosophy. I just think most voters go by "gut instinct", so if something sounds bad, they want a law against it, and if it sounds good, they want a law promoting it.
zataomm
8mo ago
Well, it may be wrong, but so far I’ve provided one definition of fraud from Georgia law and another from Merriam Webster that include deceit. You haven’t provided one that doesn’t.
zataomm
8mo ago
My question about the Secret Service was an ironic reference to the idea that if the pieces of paper from these "fake electors" were a big problem when it came time to count the votes, presumably because said papers are difficult to distinguish from the votes cast by "authentic electors," then maybe they would have to call in the Secret Service, who are in charge of prosecuting cases of counterfeiting money and therefore experts in document authentication, to help sort things out.
zataomm
8mo ago
Technically I said fraud not defraud, so that makes me the best kind of correct. Here is the relevant Georgia law, since you are a big fan.
That said, as humorous as you are, you are still wrong. What do you think is involved in the theft? Let's use our imaginations and imagine that Donald Trump says to the official who controls election data, "hey, it's me, Donald Trump, your favorite president. Way better than Carter, obviously. Anyway, I suspect there was fraud in your state, so I need access to your voter data, please send it to me by December 1st." If the official then sends Trump the election data, do you think he would be guilty of theft?
I'm going to skip the part where you answer. The only way Trump and his allies "defrauded the state" in the case at hand is if they falsely claimed that they had the right to voter data.
@Gdanning I deleted my comment on the CW thread, would you mind responding here?
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