AshLael
Just here to farm downvotes
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User ID: 2498
I see this as a pretty nakedly political decision. Not partisan - I do not believe that the court is making its decisions on the basis of what is in Trump's or the GOP's best interests - but political in the broader sense. The court has sought to lower the political temperature as a primary goal, and the Barrett concurrence is merely the most obvious evidence of that.
That's not surprising and arguably not even unwise. I resent the idea of bowing to implied threats - but nonetheless those threats can be real, and tensions really are high. Principle is all well and good but in the real world principled decisions often have consequences. It's not the worst thing in the world that those holding power flinch away from inviting chaos and conflict.
But it's legally incoherent. Apparently all the other sections of the 14th amendment can be enforced by courts without enabling legislation. And apparently even section 3 is self executing in regard to state candidates. But suddenly when it comes to federal candidates, well, the amendment may as well not exist.
It's also nonsensical that a constitutional amendment banning insurrectionists from holding office has the practical effect of giving greater ballot access to insurrectionists than those who states seek to disqualify for other reasons. It's fine for RFK Jr to be on some ballots and not others. Why is it that a state cannot disqualify someone who tried to overthrow the government, but can disqualify someone who doesn't have enough signatures? Indeed, why is it that a state can't ban an insurrectionist from the ballot, but can just legislate away presidential elections entirely and appoint electors some other arbitrary way?
I'm dissatisfied. But I wasn't really expecting satisfaction, so whatever. There have been many incoherent court decisions in the past and there will be many more in the future, and the world will keep on turning.
Hopefully at some point Congress will have the good sense to pass a bill resolving all these issues for the future, once the Trump drama has passed.
AshLael
Just here to farm downvotes
1mo ago
It's easy to imagine sticky situations that could arise with other amendments. Say for example Biden names Obama as his VP and promises to resign as soon as he gets re-elected, thereby giving Obama a 3rd term. The 22nd amendment says you can't be elected President more than twice, but it doesn't explicitly mention the Vice-Presidency, and it doesn't explicitly say you can't be appointed President after serving two terms!
It seems to me that situation would be unclear and would lead to litigation. Granted it is very unlikely, but then an attack on the Capitol to prevent Biden from taking office also seemed unlikely until it happened.
AshLael
Just here to farm downvotes
1mo ago
Are state courts not allowed to enforce any other part of the 14th amendment?
AshLael
Just here to farm downvotes
1mo ago
The thing about this argument that gets me is... states absolutely can do this without going through the charade of invoking the 14th amendment. Elections are not constitutionally required, a state could choose to give it's electoral votes to whoever the Governor chooses, or whatever other method they want.
It seems weird to me that a state has the power to block their electors from going to a candidate because they don't like his face, but not because he's an insurrectionist.
AshLael
Just here to farm downvotes
1mo ago
3.Trump wins, the filibuster gets nuked, thermostatic opinion delivers midterm victories for Democrats, Congress passes enabling legislation for section 3, Trump vetoes it to prevent himself from being removed from office, he gets impeached again for the veto...etc.
You're absolutely right that this creates the silly situation where he is disqualified from being a county commissioner but not from being a Senator. Such is life. The court decided that this was the absurdity they could live with.
But also note that it's not that he can be a Senator because he's innocent. It's that he can't be disqualified without enabling federal legislation, no matter if he's guilty.
AshLael
Just here to farm downvotes
1mo ago
Colourblind meritocracy is the best public policy approach, I fully agree. However, the challenge to colorblind meritocracy is that certain people argue "We can see racial minorities are still disadvantaged, therefore your 'colourblind meritocracy' is a lie propagated to support a system of racial supremacy". That challenge can only be defeated by pointing out that sometimes certain groups get arrested more because they are more criminal, or score lower on tests because they are less smart, or whatever. The individual should still be treated as an individual, but you cannot justify doing that unless you have an explanation other than "systemic racism" for when people notice your colourblind meritocracy finds certain colours have less merit.
AshLael
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2mo ago
True! But that's still only half the deficit.
AshLael
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2mo ago
Defaulting on debt is not much of a plan if you're not also balancing the budget.
AshLael
Just here to farm downvotes
2mo ago
I'm very aware of our recent fiscal history. We fell into deficits during the GFC, and kept running them all the way until covid, and have only recently climbed out. Obviously that period of time is going to leave a significant amount of debt (though still a fraction of what the US is burdened with).
But it's also true that all that time we were running deficits, outside of the immediate emergencies of the GFC and covid, those deficits were controversial. Wayne Swan loudly and repeatedly promised to return us to surplus, and was roundly mocked when he failed. Joe Hockey loudly and repeatedly promised to return us to surplus, and was roundly mocked when he failed. Scott Morrison went a step further and brazenly claimed to have already returned us to surplus and produced commemorative coffee mugs celebrating the achievement... based on projections for 2020. Of course covid happened and he got mocked even more roundly than his predecessors.
It was the current left wing government that ended the deficits. I'm under no illusions that Labor sincerely cares about fiscal responsibility of course, and their cheerleaders in the media are constantly agitating for them to tax and spend more. But the party is very serious about winning elections and they know that normal Australians don't like deficits or taxes.
AshLael
Just here to farm downvotes
2mo ago
The problem with huge debts is not that you have to come up with the money. You can just borrow more to pay for whatever unfunded liability you have. The issue is the growing interest bill reduces your capacity to spend on things that people actually want, for any given level of taxation. The system doesn't collapse, you just have shitty roads, underfunded police, and high taxes.
The solution is simple, if difficult. Balance the budget. Hell, you don't even need to go that far, just get the rate of debt growth below the rate of economic growth. Keep it that way, and the problem becomes steadily more and more manageable over time.
As a digression, this is one of the differences in political culture between Australia and America that I think defies the standard view of Australia being more left wing. America seems to have just given up on even pretending they're going to ever address the problem. Australia doesn't always balance the budget but our governments, Liberal or Labor, are always under pressure to do so. We currently have a left wing government delivering tax cuts and budget surpluses. I'm not sure why the difference exists, but it's notable.
AshLael
Just here to farm downvotes
2mo ago
I dunno, I've picked up some Trump support among younger people that would otherwise be politically disengaged.
AshLael
Just here to farm downvotes
2mo ago
"Message discipline" doesn't mean you don't put your foot in your mouth. It means you consistently emphasize your strong issues, de-emphasize your weak issues, and present a consistent framing and position on the issues.
When Trump says "covfefe", that's a funny typo, but not a lack of message discipline. When he proposes the death penalty for criminals like the ones that he pardoned, that's a lack of message discipline.
AshLael
Just here to farm downvotes
2mo ago
I dunno, I actually think Trump is pretty good at "reading the room" and sensing what topics to avoid/what people want to hear.
AshLael
Just here to farm downvotes
2mo ago
I think Trump has handled the Gaza issue about as well as possible from a political perspective, by shutting the hell up about it and not reminding angry leftists that the Republican party supports Israel even harder.
AshLael
Just here to farm downvotes
2mo ago
Biden is great at message discipline. His issue is that he needs to keep the Democratic coalition together (or believes he does) and that impedes his ability to go after the swing voters he needs to win.
AshLael
Just here to farm downvotes
2mo ago
I think the Gaza effect is real in terms of driving down Biden's poll numbers currently.
By the time the election rolls around? Probably not. Arabs might remain resolutely anti-Biden but there's not that many of them and the white lefties who also hate his support for Israel will come back home once the dust settles. And I'll be surprised if the war continues for more than another month or so.
AshLael
Just here to farm downvotes
2mo ago
I'm a part of a discord community that plays Diplomacy variants, and in particular large world map variants with big numbers of players. These run semi-regularly and there's a new one currently in sign-ups and I thought I'd extend an invitation here to anyone who's interested.
Diplomacy is of course a strategy game based on players negotiating between themselves before making simultaneous moves. Alliances, deception, and betrayal are a big part of the game. The standard version has 7 players and plays out in Europe, but this version (called Imperial Diplomacy and set in 1642) is quite a lot larger.
There's various modifications to the rules to balance the large size and wildly varying sizes of powers (small regional powers start with 4 units while large colonial powers can begin with up to 16). However these changes are mostly to do with win conditions and the game itself plays pretty much as you would expect if you have any experience with standard Diplomacy.
If you're interested in checking out the game or looking at the map and the ruleset in detail, you can find the server here
AshLael
Just here to farm downvotes
2mo ago
I think I quit on Fargo midway through season 3. It's a shame because seasons 1 and 2 really were extremely good.
AshLael
Just here to farm downvotes
2mo ago
It's been used much more than twice - the law has been on the books since the 50s.
I picked this case specifically because it was so clearly politically motivated, because that made it easy to have confidence that it was not actually motivated by Exxon investors who felt victimised. If you want to shift the goalposts and ask for a non-political 63(12) case instead, I can find one of those.
AshLael
Just here to farm downvotes
2mo ago
You asked for
another victimless fraud case that occurred that had zero pressure from an victim pushing for prosecution.
I provided it. If you don't want to read it, don't ask for it.
AshLael
Just here to farm downvotes
2mo ago
That's on me, I set the bar too low.
Ok so fair call out, but I'm not sure to what extent we actually disagree on substance. As you say, there may be tactical restraint, or ignorance or inability. But my core position is that political actors will attack their enemies in the most effective ways they can, and the most effective methods available will vary according to the person and situation. And I'm not sure that you even disagree with that.
One of my favourite things about working in the funeral industry was that you got a really good cross-section of the community, because everyone dies. Really helps open your eyes to the bubbles that we all live in.
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