domain:parrhesia.substack.com
AshLael
Just here to farm downvotes
3m ago
My understanding is that the law says that if the expenditure would not have occurred but for the candidacy, then it is a campaign expenditure. If it would have occurred anyway, then it is not. So in reference to the Trump case, the question is if Cohen would have paid off Daniels if Trump had not been trying to get elected. Presumably, the jury was satisfied that the evidence showed he would not have.
zeke5123a
4m ago
They are real in a humpty dumpty way.
You have already shown yourself not to be serious by citing Merchan’s judge instructions as instructive on FECA. I won’t be engaging with you further on this since you are either bad faith actor or just woefully ignorant here.
zeke5123a
5m ago
Citing that as the law is fucking hilarious. Dude is a lowly biased state trial judge. Scalia made the comment that FECA is the most highly complex law that is hard for SCOTUS justices to parse.
So here we have a biased judge who never in his life had to look at this law (ie is a complete noob) and who is a trial judge in general (ie not appellate and therefore not probably the best person to articulate the law) in one of the hardest areas in US law, but you are citing his fucking jury instructions as if that sheds any light on the law? Especially when a former head of the FEC (appointed by Bill Clinton) is saying otherwise.
I don’t know if you are doing that because you are just naive here because you’re Australian or otherwise but it just shows such a lack of knowledge.
gattsuru
13m ago
But when you impose meaningful search parameters, the truth emerges: the charges against Trump are obscure, and nearly entirely unprecedented. In fact, no state prosecutor – in New York, or Wyoming, or anywhere – has ever charged federal election laws as a direct or predicate state crime, against anyone, for anything. None. Ever. Even putting aside the specifics of election law, the Manhattan DA itself almost never brings any case in which falsification of business records is the only charge.](https://nymag.com/intelligencer/article/trump-was-convicted-but-prosecutors-contorted-the-law.html)
((It's not clear that the underlying crime was actually the federal campaign finance matter; the jury instructions just reference 17-152, which itself requires "unlawful means", and the judge verbally instructed the jury to pick any combination of FECA, other paperwork record violations, or state tax laws.))
Those surveys tend to back this up: the lightest or attempted theft in this page is still 300 USD in Ramirez, Murray in the multiple thousands, Kirkland for 350k USD(!). I can't find exact numbers for Freeland or Holley, but napkin math puts even a short duration puts it around 200 USD/month and Freeland covering multiple months, and Holley's insurance fraud claims are almost certainly closer to Murray than Ramirez. In this case, the erroneous classification probably increased, rather than decreased, Trump's final tax payment.
AshLael
Just here to farm downvotes
16m ago
According to the jury instructions, the way the law handles mixed motives is as follows:
Under federal law, a third party’s payment of a candidate’s expenses is deemed to be a contribution to the candidate unless the payment would have been made irrespective of the candidacy. If the payment would have been made even in the absence of the candidacy, the payment should not be treated as a contribution.
Chrisprattalpharaptr
Ave Imperaptor
20m ago
What are the odds China moves on Taiwan in the next 12 months?
The Ukraine war seems to be ushering in a major political realignment in the West. Previously staunch pacifists are penning pieces about how they went from left to center-left, as yesterday's liberals become today's neoliberals and tomorrow's neocons. The circle of life turns, I suppose? It certainly seems like wokeness has traveled far enough down the barber pole that my age cohort is starting to lurch rightwards. Noah Smith is writing hawkish piece after hawkish piece claiming we've entered a new cold war, with a new Axis of Russia, China, Iran and North Korea opposing America and NATO & Friends. He linked to this article making the case for a new cold war, and specifically China moving on Taiwan:
in practice. I see three main plausible scenarios:
Pearl Harbor. China combines an invasion of Taiwan with an attack on U.S. installations, at least in Guam, and possibly on Japanese territory as well. The United States, and possibly Japan, are immediately at war with China, with high likelihood of rapid escalation to general war.
Korea 1950. China attacks Taiwan, probably associated with preparations for invasion. Though, as in South Korea in 1950, the U.S. defense commitment is ambiguous, the brazen character of the attack raises the odds of at least U.S. and Japanese intervention, and all prepare for the possibility of escalation to general war.
Indirect control. China implements air and sea border controls to make Taiwan a self-governing administrative region of China. There is no need for a direct attack on Taiwan or any blockade of usual commerce. Without initiating violent action, the Chinese can assert sovereign control over the air and sea borders to Taiwan, establishing customs and immigration controls. This is not the same thing as a blockade. A blockade would instead become one of the possible consequences if the other side violently challenged China’s assertion of indirect control.
Most of the time, the arguments I see putting China's invasion 5-10 years in the future focus on the second scenario and claim China is still lacking amphibious materiel/experience to pull off a D-day tier invasion. I've only rarely seen the third possibility discussed, but it seems much more likely. The recent military exercises to point in this direction.
This is all wildly outside of my lane. What do people think the odds are that China instigates some kind of blockade or customs control over Taiwan in the next 12 months? The bull case:
- The wars in Ukraine and Israel are straining US defense production almost to breaking point already, however, waiting a few years could see China confronted with an America and EU that brought a ton more military production capacity online.
- The election will inevitably (particularly now that Trump is a felon) lead to an enormous amount of chaos between October 2024 and February 2025.
- China's relative advantages must be reaching their zenith, given demographics and the resurgence of neo-industrial policy.
- A demoralized military-class that is increasingly apathetic to foreign policy/wars that don't directly impact Americans.
The bear case:
- Significant domestic malaise following the mess of zero-COVID, the housing crash and relative slowdown of the economy (or does this make it more likely to boost support for the regime?)
- Fear of economic/military retaliation from US, Japan, Australia, Korea?
- Taiwan is a convenient way to whip up nationalism, but would be inconvenient to actually invade and potentially bungle.
- ?? Honestly, I'm having difficulty articulating reasons why China wouldn't make a move soon.
I'm interested in whether people think this is largely driven by Gell-Mann amnesia and I'm being irrationally swayed by an increasingly hawkish media environment/overly focused on domestic US politics, or whether the odds of China invading are much higher than people seem to think (although I could only find a betting market for a hot-invasion).
inappropriatecontent
Nihil Concierge
26m ago
I think this deserves to be a top-level post for the next few weeks. Sort of like Trans-National Thursdays. Supreme Court Saturdays?
zeke5123a
27m ago
Res ipsa is not appropriate here. If any time you falsify business records you per se are doing it for a reason to cover up another crime, then you’ve written the misdemeanor out of the statute since everything is a felony.
What is also black letter law is that texts should generally be read in a way that does not render any part surplusage.
The only way to give meaning to both the misdemeanor and felony is to treat the intent with respect to committing another crime as having to be proved without regard to the misdemeanor. This is especially true here because unlike burglary (ie why else did you break into someone’s home) there are many reasons why Trump might arguably falsify records (eg he didn’t realize it was false, he wanted to hide it from his wife, he thought it would be bad publicity unaware of the legal implications). The same inference is not reasonable.
So whilst I agree you don’t need to prove the actual other crime was committed you do need to prove the intent to commit a specific other crime was intended or else you render meaningless a large portion of the criminal statute at play and are making an unreasonable inference.
AshLael
Just here to farm downvotes
30m ago
I think this just is one of those where you are not well-versed with a very different legal regime than your own. I notice that you avoided talking about McIntyre v. Ohio Elections Comm'n. Do you have any comment on that case or how it could play in to a hypothetical future case that directly addresses reporting requirements?
I haven't read that case and I don't intend to.
Express advocacy has reporting requirements.
So it does. TIL.
What's the difference? You just said "any" expenditure made for the purpose of influencing the election is a campaign expenditure. So, shouldn't the latter be one, too?
Implicitly I meant "any expenditure by the candidate or people coordinating with the candidate". The distinction I was drawing was that I believed unconnected individuals did not face reporting requirements. You've now alerted me that this is not precisely the case, so I amend my answer: Not a reporting requirement nor a crime, because a "Blue Lives Matter" sign does not constitute "express advocacy".
Let me one more hypo you. One that I would be very unsurprised if it literally actually came up in arguments if we had a SCOTUS case directly on the reporting requirements. Would the pseudonymous Federalist Papers have been legal? They were all essentially politicians of various sorts and were surely running for elections at various times. The papers, themselves, were certainly aimed at influencing voting, and they could very plausibly think that it would influence things in ways that would get them elected (as they were, indeed, elected to various positions). Pseudonymous? Or reporting requirement? Criminal?
I'm not sure I understand the question? Why would they be impacted by campaign finance laws at all?
zeke5123a
36m ago
I think there clearly is since the judge did not allow evidence in where FECA / the prosecution made false statements
practical_romantic
40m ago
It sucked. Small towns are boring. I don't need to spend hours to know that
self_made_human
Kai su, teknon?
42m ago
Ah, do what you love and you'll never work a day in your life (and other lies).
Well, I suppose it's about time I get paid for deep dives into psychiatry. I do need to pad out the CV, and not just pseudonymously.
Supah_Schmendrick
48m ago
The NYT is a Jewish-dominant newspaper filled with Democrats
The NYT is a liberal, secular- and reform-Jewish-dominant newspaper. These people are just about fully-assimilated WEIRD anti-nationalists, and have no more love for the conservative religious right in Israel than they do for the conservative religious right in the U.S.
ZorbaTHut
48m ago
I've actually got a code review pending for it right now, but it's one of those annoyingly fiddly changes :/
MadMonzer
Temporarily embarrassed liberal elite
49m ago
Err wot? Falsifying business records is charged in almost every white-collar criminal indictment in New York.
See here or here for surveys on the issue, or here for an example of a criminal defence firm which holds out this kind of charge as an important practice area.
I agree that there is a bit of a reach to get to felony falsification in this case - the point I was making was that Donald Trump clearly committed a misdemeanour completely unnecessarily (and may have committed a felony depending on a legal technicality he didn't feel the need to ask a competent lawyer about) because he didn't care.
SlowBoy
49m ago
According to this logic, if the falsification of business records is inherently proof of a cover-up of an underlying crime, the falsification of any business record is proof of an underlying crime. The distinction between misdemeanor and felony charges for this crime may as well as not exist. (Why else would you "falsify" a business record?)
You say that reversing this standard would be too lenient for defenders. Upholding this standard is a recipe for jailing almost anyone at any time.
hydroacetylene
52m ago
The new world actually did offer resources not available, or available only in very short supply, in Europe.
The_Nybbler
Does not have a yacht
53m ago
The WSJ piece is from their news section which is quite progressive. The opinion section is not forgiving this show trial.The WSJ piece is from their news section which is quite progressive. The opinion section is not forgiving this show trial.
Headline from the WSJ opinion section: "Trump Was Convicted by a Jury, Not by His Political Enemies".
Trump said, without evidence, that President Biden was responsible for his conviction, saying “this was done by the Biden administration in order to wound or hurt an opponent.” Trump also implied, again without evidence, that evil big-money men are out to get him, describing Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg as a “Soros-backed D.A.” And he claimed that trial judge Juan Merchan was unfair, calling him “a conflicted judge who should have never been allowed to try this case.”
But it was 12 ordinary citizens, not Biden, Soros or Merchan, who unanimously pronounced Trump guilty on 34 felony counts. In fact, the Trump trial shows why juries have long been considered an important anti-corruption device. A sitting judge—one person, known to future litigants long in advance—is in theory easy enough to bribe. But does Trump mean to imply that all 12 of the jurors, none of whom was known in advance, were paid off by Biden or Soros? How? A judge might be tempted to kiss the hand of the state government that feeds him or, in the case of a federal judge, the president who nominated her in the past and might promote her in the future. Not so a jury.
(there is, in fact, evidence that the Biden administration was involved, and certainly evidence that people were out to get him, given that the NY AG ran on that as a campaign promise. But none of that matters, the holy jury has spoken)
ActuallyATleilaxuGhola
Axolotl Tank Class of '21
55m ago
Etiquette-wise? Do what other people are doing. Also, don't worry about looking retarded when eating, as a foreigner Japanese people will automatically assume you're retarded and there's often nothing you can do to convince them otherwise.
Recommendation-wise? This is all personal taste, but:
- Go for Korean BBQ over Japanese yakiniku. Japanese yakiniku is more expensive and less flavorful
- Small local chain kaitenzushi restaurants are often really good and pretty affordable. Avoid national chain kaitenzushi unless you just want something decent and dirt cheap.
- Go for hipster "gourmet" ramen places over greasy cheapo places. The latter are cheap but are often pretty meh unless you have a local friend who knows where the cheap AND good places are hidden.
- When you're outside of Tokyo, try whatever the local specialty or delicacy is, it's almost always delicious.
- Eat all the seafood. Eat at least once any sea creatures you've never eaten before. Kaisen-don are a decent way to get a lot of good sashimi at an affordable price.
- Try okonomiyaki, it's great
- Avoid most Chinese food here, most of it has been neutered to cater to the bland Japanese palate
- Drink nihonshu/sake, and especially local sake (jizake) outside of Tokyo
- Try the different kinds of shochu, they're interesting and unique.
- You can skip beer here, the macro brews are unremarkable and the craft beers are decent but terrible value for money compared to any western country
- Go to a really good soba place once
I think that's all I got for now.
pm_me_passion
אֲנָשִׁים נֹשְׂאֵי מָגֵן וְחֶרֶב וְדֹרְכֵי קֶשֶׁת וּלְמוּדֵי מִלְחָמָה
1hr ago
Re: NYT, it’s a stand-in for media in general. I couldn’t care less about the NYT specifically.
Gell-Mann amnesia is exactly what’s on display here. Like it or not, this is a perfect example: trusting a media report about a subject he’s less familiar with, despite already knowing how the media falsely represents subjects he’s closely familiar with.
I know he doesn’t understand Israeli politics by the things he says in the post. Again, thinking that 10% of Israelis want to because they vote for the same party they’ve always voted for is as ridiculous as thinking anyone who votes R wants to strip women of rights, and everyone who votes D wants to trans all the kids. It’s not even surface level understanding, it’s cartoonish thinking.
“You’ve been controversial for decades”, said the people living on lands stolen by genociding the natives and importing slaves. Who cares what you think?
sodiummuffin
1hr ago
I haven't verified it myself, but looking through the Reddit threads apparently it was the classic loaded survey technique of offering a range of responses and coding all of them except one extreme the same way.
https://old.reddit.com/r/askgaybros/comments/1d47y07/less_than_half_of_amsterdam_youth_accept/
I took the questionnaire from the GGD Amsterdam that was used for this research. Of the 122 questions, exactly one is about this topic. The question is, “What do you think if two girls/females or two boys/men are in love with each other?” The answers are:
- Normal
- A bit weird
- Very weird
- Wrong
They interpreted every single answer that was not "Normal" as a lack of acceptance. Many people chose options 2 and 3, with a minority actually picking "wrong".
It also has whatever ambiguities accompany the words for "normal" and "weird" in Dutch. Now, that doesn't explain the rapid shift on its own but it might help. Maybe young people have recently had less exposure to discourse regarding homosexuality so they don't know that in this case the "correct" answer is that a rare condition is completely normal?
I'm not saying that res ipsa is sufficient on its own, just that there's a certain element involved when it comes to proving intent. If the falsification of the records happened in a vacuum and there was no obvious underlying motive, that would be the misdemeanor. But when you demonstrate that the concealed payments may have covered up a potential campaign finance violation, that's probably enough evidence that a jury can infer that the potential violation was behind the concealment. Like I said in the previous post, if a guy breaks into a store the prosecution doesn't have to demonstrate that the defendant was there specifically to steal a particular item for it to be anything more than trespass; the jury can infer that because there was a very obvious motive for the break-in that the defendant intended to commit a felony. The defendant can certainly argue that that wasn't his intent and present evidence supporting that, but that's a question of fact for the jury. We can argue all day about whether there was sufficient evidence of Trump's intent to commit a campaign finance violation for the purpose of the statute, but my overall point is that arguing about the specific elements of such a violation itself or the mens rea requirement to prove a campaign finance violation is irrelevant here because we're operating on two separate legal principles.
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