domain:betonit.substack.com
SubstantialFrivolity
I'm not even supposed to be here today
19m ago
I’m not even sure it’s possible to do so
Of course it's possible. I support principled application of laws (and general principles) all the time. Just because lots of people are hypocrites doesn't mean that it's impossible to escape that, it means that they are choosing to be hypocrites.
100ProofTollBooth
Dumber than a man, but faster than a dog.
22m ago
Fucking GOAT'ed comment, to use the parlance of our times.
SubstantialFrivolity
I'm not even supposed to be here today
22m ago
Literally anything would've been cleaner. Wickard v Filburn is one of the most bad faith interpretations of the law in our country's entire history. There might be worse, but there aren't a lot of them.
Yes, but if they'd admitted to being a Nazi, they wouldn't have been naturalized.
Possibly, Probably. and the HAMASniks would have likely (or at least ought to have been) denied entry if they had gone into thier naturalization hearing chanting "death to America" and "globalize the infitada".
Have you ever aligned yourself with an enemy of the United States, if so explain the circumstances. is exactly the sort of question we ought to be asking someone before letting them in.
Muninn
"Dick Laurent is dead."
37m ago
On the other hand, I think it’s a crime against human dignity to throw ashes around in any place.
I think my wife would agree with you. She has flat out told me that if I go first, she's not putting my ashes in the 39 oz Folger's can (complete with blue lid!) that I have painstakingly procured for this purpose because she sees it as beneath my dignity. To which I say:
That's, just like, your opinion, man.
No_one
40m ago
Iran has everything to lose and nothing to gain by declaring nuclear capability.
Reaction to this top-level post on Iranian nukes.
Iran's assumption seems to have been that by permanently remaining n steps away from having nukes (n varying according to the current political and diplomatic climate), you get all the benefits of being a nuclear-armed state without the blowback of going straight for them. But no, you need to have the actual weapons in your arsenal, ready to use at a moment's notice.
It's very possible Iran ALREADY has the weapons in their arsenal.
But the weapons are militarily and strategically useless for Iran in this particular situation.
Because every current adversary already has nuclear weapons, and more of them, and could retaliate forcefully.
Why they probably have them:
Between how much time they've had to develop them, and that the half-ton of 60% HEU could have be easily boosted to weapons grade by removing the third of lighter uranium atoms from it (it'd only take days), it's nonsensical to believe Iranians do not already have nuclear weapons or couldn't have them. Making an detonating an implosion uranium bomb is something the Chinese managed in 1963 or so. Today, with supercomputers and more mature nuclear physics knowledge out there, it's not hard at all.
The 15 bombs Iran could have if we take IAEA at their word, which if used, would result in destruction of Tehran and other major cities, could kill perhaps 300-500k Israelis. It'd not destroy the country, cause it to be overrun etc.
Iranians know that if they nuked an Israeli air-base, Israelis who have more bombs would H-bomb all of their major military sites and production facilities. They're probably working on hydrogen bombs, but have not conducted a test yet. So, there are no useful targets for these bombs at all. There's no reason to say you have something you cannot even use.
Israelis do not have the resources for a sustained campaign, so why strike them? They were going to give up their campaign sooner or later.
So, in conclusion:
Obviously, even if they had the bombs, they'd keep them secret, locked up in a bunker and work on producing hydrogen bombs and ICBMs and enough of a tunnel network to guarantee survival of a second strike capability.
Announcing that they have the bombs would
- feed Israeli narrative
- not actually provide them with the required capability to deter anyone
- cause normies in Israel/West to demand an actual end to Iranian nuclear program
the only upside would be boosting national pride.
cjet79
41m ago
Government rules are enforced through violence and kidnapping.
Libertarianism poses a simple question for any would be government bans: is the thing you are trying to ban worth killing and imprisoning people to reduce that thing?
For many libertarians there are things that definitely meet that criteria. Murder, kidnapping, serious bodily assault, etc.
They phrase it in the post as "who are you to ban that thing, why should we listen to you?" But really it is "who are you to say we get to kill people just because you think something is bad?"
There are a lot of things that are bad but less bad than killing and kidnapping people. And it sometimes feels like everyone is just playing signalling games when they say the government should ban something but can't affirmatively answer "yes it is worth killing people and imprisoning them in order to ban this thing" Meanwhile it feels like libertarians are one of the few groups acknowledging the on the ground enforcement costs of government actions.
faceh
52m ago
Tooting my own horn. December 1, 2022 I predicted:
My honest bet is that any student currently in their first year of Law School will be unable to compete with AI legal services by the time they graduate. Certainly not on cost. The AI didn't incur 5-6 figure loans for it's legal training.
Put another way, the AI will be as competent/capable as a first-year associate at a law firm inside 3 years.
This was before GPT4 was on the scene. Reiterated it 3 months ago
And then today I read this nice little headline:
Artificial Intelligence is now an A+ law student, study finds
If they can stop the damn thing from hallucinating caselaw and statutes, it might already be there.
But, let me admit, that if we don't see downward pressure on first-year wages or staffing reductions this year, I missed the meatiest part of the prediction.
There's the counter-argument that AI lawyers will actually stimulate demand for attorneys by making contracts way more complex. I don't buy it, but I see it.
100ProofTollBooth
Dumber than a man, but faster than a dog.
53m ago
It's amazing how much this bleeds into other genres as well.
I have a penchant for Noir/Neo-noir novels. Think The Last Good Kiss by James Crumley. The story is full of anti-heroes. The whole point of the protagonist is that he's a beat-up, broke private eye who mostly lives to drink and works to support that habit. But there's still a ton of hints at his Vietnam service which gave him the skills to be a decent private eye. His skills were earned through a crucible in the jungle.
Iran's assumption seems to have been that by permanently remaining n steps away from having nukes (n varying according to the current political and diplomatic climate), you get all the benefits of being a nuclear-armed state without the blowback of going straight for them. But no, you need to have the actual weapons in your arsenal, ready to use at a moment's notice.
It's entirely possible Iran ALREADY has the weapons in their arsenal.
But the weapons are militarily and strategically useless for Iran in this particular situation.
Why they probably have them:
Between how much time they've had to develop them, and that the half-ton of 60% HEU could have be easily boosted to weapons grade by removing the third of lighter uranium atoms from it (it'd only take days), it's nonsensical to believe Iranians do not already have nuclear weapons. Making an detonating an implosion uranium bomb is something the Chinese managed in 1963 or so. Today, with supercomputers it's not hard at all.
This is obvious but it's obviously not talked about because then the normies would get hysterical, even though a nuclear bomb is not particularly destructive, and even the maximum of 15 20kt bombs isn't particularly destructive either. (Israeli cities are not made out of wood nor would burn as readily as Japanese WW2 ones). Nor are so dense. If Iranians wanted to have their country H-bombed, they could gravely hurt Israel by killing ~20,000 people with each bomb, tops.
Something tells me they're not the wholly irrational frothing at the mouth fanatics we're being told the are.
But they, probably correctly, calculate that if they nuked an Israeli air-base, Israelis would H-bomb all of their major military sites and production facilities. They're probably working on hydrogen bombs, but have not conducted a test yet.
No, really, what do you think they could do with these bombs if they declared they have them?
Militarily, the only possible 'clean' target are US carrier groups. US doesn't want to invade, nor could it invade. Unless it were attempting a full scale conquest of the country, this wouldn't happen.
Israeli airbases are mostly in populated areas areas, each strike would cause collateral damage. Israelis do not have the resources for a sustained campaign, so why strike them? They're going to give up. If Iran used them on Israeli military infrastructure, their own military installations would get glassed much more thoroughly.
Obviously, even if they had the bombs, they'd keep them secret, locked up in a bunker and work on producing hydrogen bombs and ICBMs and enough of a tunnel network to guarantee survival of a second strike capability.
Announcing that they have the bombs would
- feed Israeli narrative
- not actually provide them with the required capability to deter anyone
- cause normies in Israel/West to demand an actual end to Iranian nuclear program
the only upside would be boosting national pride.
pigeonburger
1hr ago
Last I checked Trump doesn't distribute the belongings of deported illegals to ICE officers, so I don't know what parallel you see.
100ProofTollBooth
Dumber than a man, but faster than a dog.
1hr ago
Congrats! That "zero to one" of actually getting the damn thing out to customers is the hardest part.
phailyoor
1hr ago
$0 tax stamps is a big deal though. I'm gonna get some $40 silencers when they come out.
Blueberry
1hr ago
Wickard v Filburn is insane mental gymnastics, but in the politics of its time it makes sense: Every farmer wanted regulation to prop up stable prices and Filburn defected (always hated). Wheat couldn’t be exported as world prices were much lower. Congress was seen as doing their job and any other decision by the court would have been seen as head-in-clouds-lawyers screwing up a common sense solution, that is why the decision was 9-0.
A constitional amendment would have been cleaner
GBRK
1hr ago
I know a little bit about medical billing and data standards since I work in the industry and more and more. i'm pulled toward the idea that heallthcare is so irreducably complex the only way to cut the red knot is either with completely privatized and unregulated healthcare mixed with trustbusting to break local emergency room monipolies, or by creating a single payer system empowered to ruthlessly negotiate for its own interests. Trying to have a system where a government pays for only the statistically sickest individuals (the poor and old) is just the worst of all possible worlds. (My preference is for single payer, but I have a certain sympathy for the idea of completely obliterating the pharmaceutical patent system, making EVERYTHING legal OTC, and letting God sort it out.)
GBRK
1hr ago
I think less precision is better because more precision would just be unecessary detail. The exact ideology of my in and near groups doesn't matter when the core fact I an trying to convey is that there are people who I emotionally care for that the OBBB negatively affects. Trying to frame that in ideological terms would just ovscure the truth.
The most telling aspect of AI art is what I call "extraneous detail." As a reaction, I've been making a deliberate effort to avoid that in my own writing.
GBRK
1hr ago
Haha fair enough. I used to have a tv with a ui language set to french and never got around to changing it because i thought it was funny.
- ICE is not personally loyal to Trump
Roman soldiers often became loyal to the generals that distributed them land and victories over the roman state itself. It's really hard to not see this dynamic replicated.
hydroacetylene
1hr ago
In many respects it is a mirror of Trumpism, being driven largely by cultural grievances around the distribution of prestige
But they have the prestige? What are these middle managers and lawyers expecting?
The_Nybbler
In the game of roller derby, women aren't just the opposing team; they're the ball.
1hr ago
I don't think it was done to the Nazis qua being a Nazi, it was done because they materially lied about it during naturalization.
Yes, but if they'd admitted to being a Nazi, they wouldn't have been naturalized. The proposed Hamasnik deportations are for the same reason.
Saying otherwise is invited gaming an already extremely gameable immigration system with the idea that if you perpetuate a fraud, tough luck it's just done.
My preferred solution would be a statute of limitations; maybe 3 years for ordinary stuff, 7 years for really bad stuff.
Jiro
1hr ago
His arguments about drugs also include pornography, which he lumps in with drugs as causing only harm. If you don't count "people like to use it" as being good, you would oppose not only drugs and pornography but also video games, comic books, vacations, and Shakespeare (except that he probably has arbitrary categories of non-harm that would allow vacations and Shakespeare).
birb_cromble
1hr ago
it doesn't give the Executive that much discretion to determine the grounds for denaturalization completely freeform.
We live in a world where supreme court precedent has determined that growing your own grain and feeding it to your own stock on your own land can be regulated under the aegis of "interstate commerce". That ship has sailed.
The_Nybbler
In the game of roller derby, women aren't just the opposing team; they're the ball.
2hr ago
But on the topic of patriotism: In so far as each citizen is a cell of the body civic - patriotism is a must-have.
"In so far". But citizens are not cells of the body civic in American political philosophy. That's a characteristic of more communitarian/corporatist philosophies such as Fascism.
anon_
2hr ago
If we're looking at individual provisions to hate, the senior citizen tax cut is an egregious transfer of wealth from the productive/fertile segment of society to the geriatric. It is, by any standard of new conservatism, an absolute disaster. If anything, we ought to tax the geriatric to give to young folks that may actually have kids and generate wealth.
Then again, it's hard to evaluate this in the broader context of a huge bill stuffed with hundreds of other provisions. Taken in isolation, it's awful, how the entire cake is baked together into a single must-pass thing is just a failure of our political process to actually deliberate and legislate.
Bit of a throwback, but I'd love this to happen so much. Good call.
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