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PaperclipPerfector  22d ago (text post)   23626 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of May 18, 2026

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The incredible part is that the lawsuit isn't even just about something the federal government did, but something the federal government did under Trump. Regardless of your thoughts about the Biden or Obama admins, allowing this logic is insane and incentivizes every future president to "harm" themselves or allies (and they of course don't even have to actually show any real harm cause it's all done through settlements!), sue themselves, and then distribute taxpayer money among themselves, their friends and other allies. It blatantly turns the government, and the American taxpayer, into a personal piggy bank.

This was already standard practice under Obama and Biden. https://www.cato.org/blog/justice-department-revives-slush-fund-settlements

Those were real lawsuits that the government filed where the defendants were going to have to pay someone no matter what, the only question being how much and to whom. It's not a practice I endorse, but it's in a totally different league than personally suing an entity you control in a case that would go nowhere for no reason other than extracting money out of them that they wouldn't have to pay if the suit actually went forward.

Both settlements mentioned in that article were between adverse parties. The innovation in this case is that Trump is funding a slush fund settlement by suing himself.

I agree with @JTarrou that the fundamental tactic is a very old left-wing one. Trump's version is more brazen in its corruption in two ways:

  • The policy change requested is a direct cash payment to Trump's allies with no pretence of a service provided in exchange, as opposed to the expansion of a government programme which hires his allies at above-market salaries.
  • When lefty NGOs sue Democratic state and local governments, they go to a lot of effort to create the impression that the settlement is negotiated between adverse parties. Trump just admits that he is suing himself.

You could say "more brazen", or you could say "more honest".

Trump has been saying this openly from the beginning, how he legally bribed all the right people because that's how the world works. His schtick has always been "I'm a member of the corrupt elite, but on your side, as proven by the hatred of your opponents".

Much of the horror at his various schemes and policies has been the breaking of kayfabe, which of course is always part of kayfabe. No, Europe, you don't have an independent foreign policy, now pay your dues and be good client states. Yes, we will fuck over our enemies and replace their governments if we can. Yes, we do want their oil. No, you can't legalize discrimination against the majority of the country in the name of anti-discrimination. It breaks all the social norms and self-delusions of the ruling elite.

Different type of settlement use. I'd agree it's abusive still but those aren't the case of the defendant and plaintiff being the same person, nor are they over actions their own admin did. Those settlements are a pretty common thing to see at the state level too.

Meanwhile not aware of anything like what Trump is doing in political history, even at the state level.

I double checked with ChatGPT too

Governors suing other state officials or legislatures over separation-of-powers disputes.

Governors continuing lawsuits filed before taking office.

Attorneys general suing agencies nominally under the same state government but independently controlled.

But an active governor directly suing agencies under their own control and then settling it internally for money or concessions favorable to themselves is not something with many clear precedents.

Starting a lawsuit against your own admin for actions under your authority and control while in office isn't even precedented at the state government level.

But ok let's say you're right and they're the same. Who is paying for this corruption? Ordinary Americans. Your logic is "The Dems robbed innocent citizens, so we should too"??

My logic is that the Dems are funding their political activism with taxpayer money, and have been for a very long time. This has been entirely uncontroversial to you personally. It is ridiculous to expect that the other party will hold to their "principles" and let them have a structural advantage permanently. Eventually, they will find someone who will exploit all the loopholes their opponents have been. Like Trump.

I can summarize all TDS with the childhood lament "Mommy he hit me back!".

My logic is that the Dems are funding their political activism with taxpayer money, and have been for a very long time. This has been entirely uncontroversial to you personally.

Well if we're making shit up about each other without knowing what the other believes, I guess you could do a lot worse.

I can summarize all TDS with the childhood lament "Mommy he hit me back!".

But it's not the Dem politicians who are paying for this, it's the American taxpayers.

So even if it's completely true that the Dems have done this exact thing over and over again, the logic here is actually "But mommy, he took candy from an innocent baby! I wanna steal candy from babies too!" instead of leaving the damn baby and his candy alone.

"Vengeance" here is just an excuse to steal from ordinary Americans, because there is no other even somewhat palatable defense anyone can present.

  • -10

We don't get that option, we only get Trump or the Democrats.

If corruption bothers you, politics is going to be a rough hobby.

something the federal government did under Trump.

You mean things that Trump tried to stop and complained about as they were happening?

Can it really be the case that you are arguing that Trump would never play 4D chess?

4D chess is itself a bad meme that fails to explain anything about Trump. (You wouldn’t say have faith that LeBron James will win because he’s playing 4D chess, although in a literal sense that’s what basketball is.)

But also, Trump did not pretend to fight his persecution so he could do this later. He fought and won, that’s all.

Was Trump not president during 2019-2020? The IRS was under his control. Now maybe he was too incompetent as a boss to ensure that the workers under him don't leak things, but that seems like his fault and I don't get why the American taxpayer should have to pay him or his allies for his own fuck ups.

First of all a large part of this settlement is wrapping up lawsuits of Trump allies suing the Biden IRS for unfairly targeting them.

Second of all, obviously in a system of separated powers the president can’t just unilaterally impose his will. We allowed American democracy to become this frankensystem of empowered bureaucrats and who answered to no one. We called it the “Deep State” although when we used this term people imagined that we meant secret council conspiracies and complained. But now, of course, Trump has won and is being allowed to remake the government. What you call “incompetence” is the consequence of a big dramatic fight that has lasted the last ten years.

First of all a large part of this settlement is wrapping up lawsuits of Trump allies suing the Biden IRS for unfairly targeting them.

Then why is it specifically focused around the Trump lawsuit against the Trump government? "But what about other things that is more defensible!" is the literal motte and bailey.

Defend the actual thing and explain why American taxpayers (who are already facing a >100% GDP deficit and rising costs due to campaign lies not being followed) should now have to pay billions for a settlement in a Trump v Trump admin suit.

Second of all, obviously in a system of separated powers the president can’t just unilaterally impose his will.

Damn, I wonder why the founding fathers did that.

Except the modern US is system of unaccountable power and not of separated one. You have many agencies that are neither accountable to the president nor the congress and have the capacity to make and enforce regulations as if they are both.

Except the modern US is system of unaccountable power and not of separated one. You have many agencies that are neither accountable to the president nor the congress and have the capacity to make and enforce regulations as if they are both.

That's explicitly not true. If Congress passed a bill and the president signed it (or it was veto proof), then they could shut down and change any congressionally created agency in any manner they wish. That Congress chooses not to do this does not make it unaccountable.

You should at least have an accurate complaint when you're upset about something.

The IRS was out of control and lawlessly leaked his tax returns. This is a reoccurring problem with Federal bureaucracies illegally defying the Executive if he's a Republican.

The IRS was out of control

Isn't the appropriate phrasing here "Trump had lost control of the IRS," or even "Trump never established control of the IRS"?

Aside from the optical issues of sueing yourself, it reveals the deeper issue. Trump has done little to nothing to actually change the systemic problems of government bureaucracy; instead, he's most interested in simple legible money, which he'll skim off the top and distribute as spoils to his allies. This does nothing to actually change the culture, but it's an equilibrium satisfying to both sides: bureaucracy keeps getting their paychecks, and now Trump hanger-ons get paychecks too. Even Trump haters get something too: more outrage of the day to cement their sense of identity.

The only losers are taxpayers and people who want effective government.

Trump has done little to nothing to actually change the systemic problems of government bureaucracy...

... back when the records were leaked. I think Trump has learned from this.

Now maybe he was too incompetent as a boss to ensure that the workers under him don't leak things,

I don't think competence is the limiting factor in something like this. Without resorting to scifi or fantasy, it's hard to fathom how the POTUS could be sufficiently "competent" as to guarantee that no leaks in the entire federal government happens ever. Of course, the buck stops with the POTUS, but also, e.g. we don't execute the POTUS every time someone in the federal government is convicted of treason, and I think the reason we don't is that we don't assign blame to the POTUS for every individual crime that anyone working under him commits (maybe we should! The world might be a lot better in a lot of ways). And I think it's reasonable to believe that not assigning such blame is the correct thing to do.

POTUS appoints the people who run the agencies or appoints the people who appoints the people and so on and so forth. Like you said, the buck stops with them.

Does that mean they get personal blame for everything a random employee does? No. But it's still nonsense logic to try to sue your administration for what your admin did.

  • -16

POTUS appoints the people who run the agencies or appoints the people who appoints the people and so on and so forth. Like you said, the buck stops with them.

Do you know what the civil service system is?

To answer Iconochasm's question for you, @magicalkittycat, below a certain level the people in the IRS (and most other government organs) are not considered "political appointees" and can't be fired without cause, due to the Pendleton Act. This is fine when dealing with individual loose cannons, as if they do something crazy they'll be fired for cause. The problem Donald Trump has, however, is that the #Resistance to him is/was systemic, and systemic sabotage is resistant to investigation because the rebellious employees will cover for each other against probes by management (and the Pendleton Act also stops political hiring to those positions, so the workaround of "bring in a bunch of new blood that's been vetted against the offending ideology, and use them to spy on the rest to spot the bad apples" was also blocked), so getting the evidence to fire people for cause is/was actually very difficult.

Does that mean they get personal blame for everything a random employee does? No. But it's still nonsense logic to try to sue your administration for what your admin did.

That'd depend heavily on the precise set of details. As you said, the POTUS doesn't get personal blame for everything a random employee does.

Yes, but if you establish this as a precedent then the next president to come along can just wink wink nudge nudge and trigger similar events performatively: publicly complaining while secretly encouraging it behind closed doors in order to enrich themselves. Even if Trump as trailblazer did not set this up on purpose, it is a trail we do not want blazed.

Obama blazed this trail. Eric Holder would sue companies over disparate impact (which is an impossible standard to follow), then make them pay out a big DOJ slush fund in settlement. Which itself is just an extension of the NGO-government pipeline Democrats long-go pioneered. There is no new precedent here, the government has been suing itself to achieve ends it could not achieve democratically for a loooooong time now.

Clinton blazed the trail, Obama reinforced it, and now that the Democrats are getting a taste of thier own "machine" politics style medicine they don't like it.

Are Democrat politicians paying for the fund or is it the average American taxpayer who has to pay?

The US taxpayer. See all the wailing and gnashing of teeth surrounding DOGE and the cuts to USAID early lat year.

If an NGO has to cease operations because DOGE cut its funding, it was never really a "Non-government Organization" to begin with.

American taxpayer pays either way, that's how the government works.

I dislike the system but I'd rather pay people abused by the IRS than a bunch of NGOs trailblazing through the Darien Gap or campaigning for more two-tiered justice system or whatever.

The government is the party that did the thing he sued for. If he is not allowed to use that tactic here because the taxpayers pay for the government, that would essentially make the government immune to being sued.

Of course the details for Democrat cases depends on the case in question. For the BLM example linked above by georgioz, the taxpayer did indeed pay (by these same standards).

This is nonsense, of course. Government is just people. There's a person who did the thing that he sued for, and that person has a name and a birthday and an address. That person can have their property taken away and can be imprisoned.

Why should I have to pay for the crimes of the government?

That person is anonymous and large bureaucracies are opaque and resistant to external investigation. In a better world this person would be in prison. But alas we don't and won't live in such a happy world.

More comments

Do you have this objection to all lawsuits against the government?

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