214 Comments

  1. SDF-7

    We’re Now Spending More On Debt Interest Than Defense

    And soon we’ll be spending more than entitlements…. Yay!

    Morning, Banjos! Morning, all… enjoy the sunshine where you have it… the Sky Wolf didn’t eat the sun this time around! 😉

    • R C Dean

      For some reason, that brought this saying to mind:

      “Americans pay for far more government than they get, and they get far more government than they need,”

      Debt leverages everything, I guess.

  2. cavalier973

    “Why don’t you fake rob this store, and I will fake stop you.”

    • cavalier973

      Should be “fakin’” instead of “fake”

  3. UnCivilServant

    Judge Orders Witness Names to Remain Secret in Trump Classified Docs Case

    So, no right to face your accuser if you’re unpersoned?

    • SDF-7

      The National Security exception to the Constitution continues apace.

      • juris imprudent

        The two words that didn’t exist before 1947.

    • Suthenboy

      Charged with victimless ‘not a crime’
      Special prosecution just for him everyone else assured
      Cant post bond as bonding companies are catch-22’d out.
      Cant present a defense
      Secret witnesses
      Judge makes verdict a foregone conclusion before trial

      Has the CJ system done one single legal action against him yet? They have made a joke of themselves destroying rule of law.

      • cavalier973

        I’m going to screenshot this post.

  4. Not Adahn

    Despite our missteps at NPR, defunding isn’t the answer.

    Of course not. Even though we’re constantly told that taxbux only make up a tiny insignificant fraction of NPR’s budget, it mustn’t be cut off.

    • UnCivilServant

      No country with government funded media can be called anything but corrupt.

      • Fourscore

        Biting the hand that feeds you is dangerous to the biter? Noooooo………….

    • Not Adahn

      In February, our audience insights team sent an email proudly announcing that we had a higher trustworthy score than CNN or The New York Times. But the research from Harris Poll is hardly reassuring. It found that “3-in-10 audience members familiar with NPR said they associate NPR with the characteristic ‘trustworthy.’ ” Only in a world where media credibility has completely imploded would a 3-in-10 trustworthy score be something to boast about.

      ALOL.

      The fact that journalismists can live with themselves, not to mention project an unshakeable air of sefl-righteous self-regard, just demonstrates that you don’t hate them enoough.

      • Nephilium

        Consider that 3 in 10 score is HIGHER than CNN/NYT’s score.

      • Not Adahn

        Wikipedia tells me that the NYT is the most reliablest source of all reliable sources.

      • Nephilium

        Local billboards tell me that the #1 Trusted News Source is the Epoch times.

      • bacon-magic

        Trusted by all goodthinkers.

      • juris imprudent

        That’s a batting average that’ll keep you in the major leagues for your entire career!

    • Zwak says the real is not governable, but self-governing.

      That idiot still cannot see how much damage NPR has done. And it ain’t just trust.

      • Not Adahn

        He’s been with them for 25 years. That’s a lot of codependency to build up.

      • Not Adahn

        Let the piling on begin!!!!

        “I don’t think I’m any wild-eyed conservative, but they thought I was too conservative a Black guy for their kind of company,” he said.

        “Not only did they fire me — they called me a psycho. I mean, they said horrible things about me quite publicly. So, no, it doesn’t surprise me what [Berliner] had to say.”

        Williams noted his controversy happened long before former President Trump appeared on the political scene in 2015 and threw the media into fits that continue today.

        “So they are a very much an insulated cadre of people who think they’re right, and they have a hard time with people who are different,” he said.

        https://www.foxnews.com/media/juan-williams-responds-editors-charges-npr-bias-insulated-cadre-people-who-think-theyre-right

      • R C Dean

        When you think Juan freaking Williams is MAGA-adjacent, you should probably consider the possibility that your brain is broken.

      • Fatty Bolger

        Yeah, Trump may have accelerated the rot, but it was already very deep already.

    • Not Adahn

      When I suggested we had a diversity problem with a score of 87 Democrats and zero Republicans, the response wasn’t hostile. It was worse. It was met with profound indifference. I got a few messages from surprised, curious colleagues. But the messages were of the “oh wow, that’s weird” variety, as if the lopsided tally was a random anomaly rather than a critical failure of our diversity North Star.

      Obviously they can’t have any problems. It must be that racist wipipo math trying to tircknologize them.

      On March 10, 2022, I wrote to a top news executive about the numerous times we described the controversial education bill in Florida as the “Don’t Say Gay” bill when it didn’t even use the word gay. I pushed to set the record straight, and wrote another time to ask why we keep using that word that many Hispanics hate—Latinx. On March 31, 2022, I was invited to a managers’ meeting to present my observations.

      Throughout these exchanges, no one has ever trashed me. That’s not the NPR way. People are polite. But nothing changes. So I’ve become a visible wrong-thinker at a place I love. It’s uncomfortable, sometimes heartbreaking.

      Their bias is so obvious that even they know that they’re doing it.

      • rhywun

        Of course they know. It’s deliberate. I fully expect they require a political statement before hiring – like colleges are doing now. And hospitals. And….

      • Suthenboy

        “Of course they know. It’s deliberate.”
        Foreseeable consequences are not unintended. The road they have taken only leads to one place. There is no excuse for what they have done and deserve heapin’ helpin’s of the consequences.
        NPR should never have existed in the first place.

        Slum: He is just now coming out because their sins are too big and too obvious to hide anymore. Fuck him. He gets credit for being a mendacious asshole, that’s all. Everyone in the media knows about their past transgressions….covering up for monsters and scum, yet they keep doing it.
        They have the utilitarian ‘gotta crack a few eggs’ view. Individuals are just means to an end.
        Just like I can they see the trail of broken eggshells going back and disappearing into the mists of time and no omelet in sight. There was never any omelet, never any intention of creating one. Fuck the mendacious cunts. As pointed out already no matter how much you hate them it isn’t as much as they deserve.
        I know, y’all are thinking “Dont sugar coat it, tell us what you really think.”

      • slumbrew

        I’m willing to extend a bit more grace and credit him with acting in good faith.

      • Suthenboy

        Is he? Or is he preemptively surrendering because he sees the cops breaking in the door?

      • slumbrew

        You gotta give the guy credit for calling this out – even if we think it’s obvious, he sounds like a lone voice at NPR.

        He still works there, so I can’t imagine the amount of shit he’s going to get for daring to publish with the wrong-thinkers at The Free Press.

        I thought this was totally wild:

        The current [SAG-AFTRA] contract, in a section on DEI, requires NPR management to “keep up to date with current language and style guidance from journalism affinity groups” and to inform employees if language differs from the diktats of those groups. In such a case, the dispute could go before the DEI Accountability Committee.

      • UnCivilServant

        Why does NPR have any contract with the Cartel?

      • Timeloose

        So much this. We should be supporting not shitting on the guy for recognizing an issue and trying to improve his workplace and journo in general. Whatever his slant, if he is pushing for more diversity in thought and objectivity at an institution that seems to have purged all who are not of the body, then I give him my respect.

        “Welcome to the party pal”

        Disclaimer:
        I have been known to listen to NPR and PBS in the past and give credit to PBS and NPR for a lot of my early life exposure to things outside of my little corner of the world. I don’t think they should be taxpayer funded to maintain their existence.

      • Fatty Bolger

        I used to listen to them a lot, but at some point it just became impossible.

    • R C Dean

      “Like many unfortunate things, the rise of advocacy took off with Donald Trump.”

      So it’s still Trump’s fault. I’m surprised he didn’t find a way to blame global warming, too.

      And he thought the endless tongue baths of Obama were just fine?

      Sorry, Uri, but your long journey to self-awareness has barely begun. Keep at it, champ!

      • Not Adahn

        A quarter century is a long time to spend at a place, especially one with a culture of self-regard. So far the EIC has responded to this with a “NYET! Radio station is fine!” I am curious exactly how long it will take for Uri and NPR to come to a “respectful and amicable parting of the ways.”

      • Not Adahn

        https://www.npr.org/2024/04/09/1243755769/npr-journalist-uri-berliner-trust-diversity

        Given Berliner’s account of private conversations, several NPR journalists question whether they can now trust him with unguarded assessments about stories in real time. Others express frustration that he had not sought out comment in advance of publication. Berliner acknowledged to me that for this story, he did not seek NPR’s approval to publish the piece, nor did he give the network advance notice.

        Some of Berliner’s NPR colleagues are responding heatedly. Fernando Alfonso, a senior supervising editor for digital news, wrote that he wholeheartedly rejected Berliner’s critique of the coverage of the Israel-Hamas conflict, for which NPR’s journalists, like their peers, periodically put themselves at risk.

        Alfonso also took issue with Berliner’s concern over the focus on diversity at NPR.

        “As a person of color who has often worked in newsrooms with little to no people who look like me, the efforts NPR has made to diversify its workforce and its sources are unique and appropriate given the news industry’s long-standing lack of diversity,” Alfonso says. “These efforts should be celebrated and not denigrated as Uri has done.”

      • Not Adahn

        And of course, reality (when it’s not white supremacist math that is) has a liberal bias:

        <blockquote.Others questioned Berliner's logic. "This probably gets causality somewhat backward," tweeted Semafor Washington editor Jordan Weissmann. "I'd guess that a lot of NPR listeners who voted for [Mitt] Romney have changed how they identify politically."

        Similarly, Nieman Lab founder Joshua Benton suggested the rise of Trump alienated many NPR-appreciating Republicans from the GOP.

      • Zwak says the real is not governable, but self-governing.

        Jesus H Tiddy Fucking Christ, talk about missing the plot.

      • juris imprudent

        It’s quite deliberate. There are things right in front of your face that you must-not-notice, in order to sustain the illusion.

      • Zwak says the real is not governable, but self-governing.

        “It is difficult to get a man to understand something when his salary depends upon his not understanding it.” – Upton Sinclair

      • R C Dean

        I think he does have a point that the GOPey RINO wing of the party that hate Trump with the white-hot intensity of a thousand suns are likely NPR listeners.

      • Zwak says the real is not governable, but self-governing.

        The Liz Cheney mud faps?

      • juris imprudent

        I have to admit – this formulation always cracks me up. That the people who have been life-long Republicans are RINOs. GOP-e sure, that makes sense, but considering Trump is still a 90s Democrat despite the Republican label (hey, isn’t that the definition of a RINO?).

      • Certified Public Asshat

        What makes Mitt Romney not a 90s Democrat?

      • juris imprudent

        Romney-care in MA? Remember how much the Democrats delighted in telling us how Obamacare was modeled on that?

      • Certified Public Asshat

        I guess we’re sort of agreeing to the same idea that RINO is a meaningless term. Is a Republican someone who opposes the Democrats or constantly folds to their wishes? Michael Malice’s line that conservatism is progressivism driving the speed limit is apropos.

      • Suthenboy

        I see people as ends in themselves. Institutions exist to serve the best interest of individuals.

        I see individuals as means to ends. Individuals only exist to further the interests of institutions.

        With those two at opposite ends of an axis I imagine there is a nice, perfect bell curve in between. I am what one might label an ‘outlier’ on the first point listed.

      • slumbrew

        “I guess we’re sort of agreeing to the same idea…”

        Violent agreement is a Glibs tradition.

      • juris imprudent

        Michael Malice’s line that conservatism is progressivism driving the speed limit is apropos.

        No one is more conservative of SocSec as it is than a progressive. Sometimes the label obscures more than it reveals.

  5. SDF-7

    Biden Could Be Left off Alabama’s General Election Ballot if Key Deadline Is Missed

    So….. move the convention up? Make it clear that the convention is for show and just certify PPP as a candidate early?

    Trot out whatever crap they were going to do to kick Cracky’s Dad off the ballot a little early so they can certify who they’re actually going to run?

    Or just say AL and OH are lost causes anyway, we don’t care? We’ll make up for it in our swing states with fortification!

    Weird, weird election cycles these days — I guess that’s what comes of not actually running campaigns because you’re tired of pretending democracy matters (while prog-jecting that onto the Stupid Party).

    • UnCivilServant

      “We got the best kickbacks from this venue for that date”

    • cavalier973

      Put “Democrat Nominee, whoever he/sue is” on the ballot.

      Seriously, though, unless the convention is being held the week before the election, how is it too late?

      • UnCivilServant

        There are clearly defined statutory deadlines that are not secret and haven’t been changed recently.

        If you can’t figure out how to make up your mind before that, you don’t belong on the ballot. This isn’t like the secret “All names you’ve gone by” requirement not listed on the Ohio forms, this is “Just show up on time” level of responsibility.

      • R C Dean

        It may only take a week (these days) to print and distribute millions of ballots with the right names on them, but of course now you need time to mail all the junk mail ballots and give plenty of time for them to be harvested.

        Plus, somewhat more seriously, a hard deadline a few months in advance reduces the chances for shenanigans with swapping candidates in and out, etc. and theoretically gives the voters (to the extent they matter) time to figure out which one is the least bad.

  6. SDF-7

    ‘warrantless searches of U.S. person communications in the FISA 702 database’

    You know… regardless of what’s in the Patriot Act, whatever set up FISA in the first place, etc…. that procedure is unconstitutional on its face if anyone bothered to read the Bill of Rights. Similar logic as “shall not be infringed means “Issue only to my friends, background checks on every bullet, red flag checks to take them away if we decide you dislike the government…”, I know.

    • SDF-7

      Oh, and I just can’t find myself getting excited because we’ve seen this “end FISA, end the surveillance” too many times now. They’ll bluster about it — maybe a few will vote for it… but most of them will happily continue to give the IC whatever they want, bolstering the rest of the country’s thoughts that they’re all just compromised as hell.

      I’ve seen the dance, the particular ones doing the moves no longer interest me.

      • Not Adahn

        Since the IC already has kompromat on congresscritters, it’s only fair they get it on the peons too.

      • Grummun

        Thanks, Epstein! And now P-Diddy, too!

    • juris imprudent

      Fault the Church Commission – they could’ve burnt the FBI to the ground and salted the earth, but they believed reform was possible.

      • Not Adahn

        But without the FBI, which bureau will investigate federal crimes?

      • juris imprudent

        federal crimes

        Well, if we take the Constitution at its word, there is no police power – sooooo…

      • Not Adahn

        Oh, sorry, I thought they were supposed to be investing crimes committed by the federal governemnt.

      • The Other Kevin

        That’s my argument. We have the Secret Service, US Marshals, ATF, DEA, Border Patrol, Homeland Security, and I’m sure I missed a few. All redundant. The only unique thing the FBI does is political persecution.

      • juris imprudent

        But see, this time they are on the right side of history, so it’s them and the angels! All good, man, all good.

  7. Sensei

    So just about like every other recent high tech weapon in the US arsenal?

    Skydio’s drones flew off course and were lost, victims of Russia’s electronic warfare. The company has since gone back to the drawing board to build a new fleet.

    Most small drones from U.S. startups have failed to perform in combat, dashing companies’ hopes that a badge of being battle-tested would bring the startups sales and attention. It is also bad news for the Pentagon, which needs a reliable supply of thousands of small, unmanned aircraft.

    https://www.wsj.com/world/how-american-drones-failed-to-turn-the-tide-in-ukraine-b0ebbac3?st=qxur8ei1o5os1pk&reflink=desktopwebshare_permalink

    • UnCivilServant

      Let me guess, they didn’t have the least understanding of electronic warfare basics?

      “We encrypted the signal, what went wrong?”

      “They jammed all our frequencies with a bunch of noisy random data the cheap reciever couldn’t sift through.”

      • SDF-7

        “We designed it for a battlefield where the F-22s and F-35s take out all emissions sites first! What do you mean that won’t always happen?”

      • EvilSheldon

        At this point, what the DoD really needs is to badly lose a war.

      • Derpetologist

        Russia’s military is hopelessly inept! And a clear and present danger to the world! And staffed with alcoholic conscripts! And has highly advanced weapons!
        And has an economy smaller than Canada! And interfered in the 2016 election!

        Mr. President, we cannot allow a contradictory propaganda gap!

      • Suthenboy

        As boogeymen go all of the money in the world cant buy a better one than Russia.

      • juris imprudent

        Commercial systems are not allowed to encrypt or evade EW. They are required to behave nicely and predictably in the spectrum they are allowed to operate in.

      • UnCivilServant

        Got a reference for that?

        And if you’re designing for a warzone, why would you stick to such a rule?

      • juris imprudent

        These were commercial products and no I don’t have the FCC regs handy. But 20 years in dealing with military radios and why we don’t just use commercial products (or, god forbid, we actually do).

      • dbleagle

        2003-2004 cheap commercial radios and GPS devices were ubiquitous among the US Army in Iraq. Soldiers just had families send them over. What worked against a technologically unadvanced enemy won’t work against more of a peer enemy.

        EW is a huge part of the present and future battlespace. We need a light and efficient procurement system- and we got DoD instead.

    • Not Adahn

      I am uncharitably envisioning taught-to-be-fragile Millennials and Zoomers in Silicon Valley actually thinking they can design something that can handle being shot at. I wonder how much of the code was written to deal with PTSD and trauma?

      • UnCivilServant

        It wasn’t even shot at from the sounds of it.

      • Not Adahn

        Did the rooskies broadcast deadnames at the drone?

      • SDF-7

        So… stale DNS entries?

      • Not Adahn

        Handshake? Ableist otherizer!

      • Grummun

        stale DNS entries

        Nice one.

      • Drake

        It was the victim of electronic bullying and chose to run away.

      • UnCivilServant

        “There’s no place like 127.0.0.1. There’s no place like 127.0.0.1.”

      • Derpetologist

        If it sends a signal, it can be tracked. If it gets a signal, it can be hacked. Signals can be spoofed and jammed. Codes produced by machines can be broken by machines.

        visual aid: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UaIbgOqQqFc

        Here endeth the world’s shortest lesson in cryptography and electronic warfare.

  8. Derpetologist

    NPR Guy: I’ve become a visible wrong-thinker at a place I love!

    Me: What a shame. Have a seat and let me tell you about what I’ve been through.

    • Not Adahn

      Listen bub, are YOU an award-winning journalismist? Didn’t think so.

  9. Sensei

    In case you actually thought Wall St and DC didn’t really collude.

    – JPMorgan and BlackRock were among firms in contact with a BLS economist for CPI details, raising concerns about data access fairness.
    – The “super user” email list facilitated exchanges on CPI computations, including shelter and used cars categories.
    – The BLS aims to restore trust after an email mistake suggested unequal information access, emphasizing public data security and fairness.

    https://super.news/en/articles/2024/04/09/jp-morgan-black-rock-in-bls-cpi-data-super-user-controversy

    Good news is they plan to “restore trust”.

    • cavalier973

      The stock market is rigged. The best an individual investor can do is buy and hold for decades, or buy after the trough and sell before the peak, following what the “big guys” do.

      • Sensei

        As it’s been part of my career for decades I won’t go that far. I can, however, tell you what parts individuals should avoid.

      • R C Dean

        “what parts individuals should avoid”

        Equities?

    • R C Dean

      “The BLS aims to restore trust after an email mistake suggested unequal information access”

      Clearly, the mistake was that the untermenschen somehow found out.

      • Sensei

        Precisely.

    • Brochettaward

      Interesting note on the ability of the ancient Greeks to reach the Polynesian islands – ancient Egyptians likely did have contact with territories as far away as Australia. They had boomerangs which they called the foreigner’s weapon. Not to go into the Gosford Glyphs which would be awfully difficult to fake.

      I think if you question people around here, you would find plenty of distrust of big science in parts and the parts where they are most trusting is going to be where they are most ignorant. The more knowledgeable in an area, the more distrust you’ll find.

      • Brochettaward

        Einstein said you don’t need 100 scientists to disprove him. Just a single fact that he couldn’t account for. That’s real science.

        When it comes to the areas of “science” I’m most critical of, it’s the opposite and those who attacked me the most here go along. If you can’t account for, say, Polynesian DNA showing up only in South America dating back to 13,000 BC with your current hypothesis on the movements of ancient people, their interconnectivity, and their technology level, you can’t just ignore that evidence. Your theory is wrong.

      • Brochettaward

        Sorry, 11,000 years ago.

      • UnCivilServant

        Pacific currents wash maerials up on the west coast of the Americas from pretty much anywhere if left adrift.

        We know that a population arrived and some of them lived long enough to make an impression. What is up for debate is whether there was any intentional repeate voyage, which the age of the last introduction of Polynesian genetic material indicates that there wasn’t constant contact. The most probable scenario is a trade convoy or colonization flotilla missed its intended island destination and ended up carried to the American shore, with no successful attempt at a return voyage.

      • UnCivilServant

        Sorry that was the more recent one.

        The 11kya event could just as easily have been a land migration from a group (population Y) closely related to the common ancestor of the polynesians. They are not particularly widespread, and finding the data from your cryptic references wasn’t easy.

      • Brochettaward

        UCS, if you think it’s more likely that a large migration crossed over land from Siberia all the way down through Canada and America and Mexico to reach the Amazon while leaving no traces anywhere else, then sure. It’s technically possible to explain another way.

        The simplest answer, the one that actually fits the evidence best, is that they crossed by sea. The researches who initially found the DNA link believed it must have occurred this way. It’s only the archaeologists who insist that the technology didn’t exist who maintain it must have happened by land.

      • Brochettaward

        Except, you know, the DNA evidence indicates that the migration was fairly large, UCS, coming from the Polynesian islands and Australia. And it shows up nowhere in North or Central America. And the archaeologists don’t even attempt to explain it this way, but instead insist that it was a land migration through Siberia and land bridges that somehow left no traces over the other territories those people would have needed to cross.

        I posted an article on this back during the initial debate. The researchers who found the DNA evidence asked archaeologists if it was possible they could have gotten their by sea as the DNA evidence indicates, and the archaeologists said no. They had to contort the evidence to fit their theory.

      • UnCivilServant

        “Fairly large” yet has so small a footprint that it could not be.

        North America also has a void in the genetic history because native tribes are extremely resistant to being tested. We can’t actually associate human remains in the ground to current populations because of that lack of data and laws that assume oral assertions of association lead to a lot of them not getting tested as tribes tie it up in threatened litigation the moment bones show up.

        We don’t know the route Population Y took, we don’t know if successive waves slaughtered their way through previous inhabitants or intermarried.

      • juris imprudent

        They had to contort the evidence to fit their theory.

        SCIENCE!

      • Not Adahn

        I still don’t know what you mean by “Polynesian DNA.”

        But the idea that science requires equipment or abilities beyond the reach of the ancients is just bogus:

        https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xoDYvvEcIbo

        Unfortunately the guy does make a positive statement about government funding and Big Science, but still a good example how two Greeks without telescopes or even modern numerals figured out the sizes and the positions of the Earth, Moon, and Sun.

      • UnCivilServant

        All you need to reach any non arctic/antarctic coast is an outrigger canoe.

        These rot easily, so their exact date of invention is uknown. The oldest dugout canoe is early paleolithic, and it’s a marvel it survived long enough to be found. I’m quite miffed that all traditional migration theories ignore the use of simple boats Yet acknowledge humans reached Australia in numbers over 55kya. Australia didn’t have the benefit of a land bridge.

        You can do a lot with simple tools. Modern tools just make it easier.

      • Brochettaward

        And I fail to comprehend how someone could be confused by what is being communicated. If you aren’t being deliberately obtuse, it’s a form of autism I’m unfamiliar with.

        South Americans share DNA/common ancestors with aboriginal and Polynesian populations.

      • UnCivilServant

        We have pockets of people showing evidence of two or three distinct admixture events, none of them as widespread as you imply with your wording.

      • Brochettaward

        Ok, UCS. Meanwhile, the researchers are left asking the same questions I’m posing to you:

        One unanswered question is why the Y signal hasn’t turned up in any North or Central American Indigenous groups. One possibility, Hünemeier suggests, is that the Y signal–bearing migrants simply stuck to the coast and made it to South America without leaving any genetic legacy up north. It’s also possible that groups with Y ancestry did live in North and Central America, but died out in the deadly aftermath of European colonization. “The population Y signal is a puzzle,” Meltzer says, “but this is an interesting piece to add to it.”

        https://www.science.org/content/article/earliest-south-american-migrants-had-australian-melanesian-ancestry

      • Brochettaward

        You don’t have to believe it was necessarily by sea. You simply have to admit it’s a very real possibility. A very real possibility that modern archaeological paradigms don’t account for.

        I’d obviously go further and suggest that the sea route simply fits the evidence the best, and that it’s completely wrongheaded to try and evade asking the basic question of whether they could have crossed by sea.

      • UnCivilServant

        UnCivilServant on April 10, 2024 at 8:37 am

        All you need to reach any non arctic/antarctic coast is an outrigger canoe.

        These rot easily, so their exact date of invention is uknown. The oldest dugout canoe is early paleolithic, and it’s a marvel it survived long enough to be found. I’m quite miffed that all traditional migration theories ignore the use of simple boats Yet acknowledge humans reached Australia in numbers over 55kya. Australia didn’t have the benefit of a land bridge.

        UnCivilServant on April 10, 2024 at 8:27 am

        Pacific currents wash maerials up on the west coast of the Americas from pretty much anywhere if left adrift.

        I’m not arguing it’s impossible. In fact, our actual positions are probably closer than the tone of the discussion would imply.

        It doesn’t help that the coastline from that time is just plain gone underwater. A lot of missing data from a classic human habitat.

      • Not Adahn

        What, exactly is Polynesian DNA? What makes DNA distinctly Polynesian as opposed to Human or Pacific Region inhabitant or “Black hair/straight hair/epicanthic folds.” And more importantly what is the degree of variance* that distinguishes “Polynesian from “Not Polynesian.” Unless you’re claiming that Polynesians can’t take blood donations, or organ transplants from non-Polynesians, then you MUST be talking about some sort of… what? SNP? Specific allele?

        The fact that you don’t know what you’re talking about is what keeps me from taking your recommendations seriously. Even more important is that asterisked part, which is what was used all the freaking time by the pseudoscience grifters of the ’60s and ’70s (and occasionally today when they talk about “X ancient site being ‘aligned with’ (+/- whatever arbitrary value I need to make this claim true) Y ancient site (or Andromeda galaxy or whatever.)”

      • UnCivilServant

        It’s a shorthand for a collection of alleles and y-chomosome and mitrochondrian DNA strains which are indicative of a particular line of descent found in polynesia.

      • R C Dean

        We possess the ability to associate DNA with particular subgroups, which in turn originate from and are associated with particular geographic regions. I don’t think anyone would say that what 23 and Me does is total hogwash, that saying your ancestry is from regions X, Y, and Z is on par with phlogiston. I’m kinda with Bro on this one – “Polynesian DNA” is shorthand for “DNA that is associated with people originating from the South Pacific”.

        In fact, it looks to me like the dispute isn’t about whether people from Polynesia set foot in the Americas in pre-Colombian times. The only argument is how they got here.

        I get it, Bro’s Firster schtick annoys some people, but when he breaks character, it worth a read.

      • Not Adahn

        Except, without knowing exactly what you mean by “X DNA,” You have no way of distinguishing between:

        1. People from Area X went to location Y
        2. People from Area Y independently developed the same DNA characteristics as people in Area X
        3. People from area Z had descendants that settled in areas X and Y

        And if you’re a partisan of one of those particular schools you can used evidence of either of the other two to “prove” the one you favor.

        The argument via grammar is even worse for establishing descent, since #2 is incredibly common.

      • UnCivilServant

        With the number of data points involved, you don’t get situation 2. We’re not talking a handful of visible external traits.

        There is some mechanism by which they determine the time since last common ancestor. I don’t understand the mechanics of it, but the timing of #1 and #3 can both be identified. Assuming the methodology I don’t understand provides the information it is purported to.

    • Zwak says the real is not governable, but self-governing.

      No. This all matches what my father (and uncle, for that matter) were saying back in the sixties and seventies. Both were PhDs with tenure or tenure track, both were exposed to the BS and either left academia (my uncle), or retired as early as possible, disgusted with the state of universities.

  10. SDF-7

    I played https://squaredle.com/xp 04/10:
    *24/24 words (+2 bonus words)
    🎯 In the top 12% by accuracy

    I played https://squaredle.com 04/10:
    *43/43 words (+2 bonus words)
    🎯 Perfect accuracy
    🔥 Solve streak: 322

    • Sean

      I played https://squaredle.com/xp 04/10:
      *24/24 words (+4 bonus words)
      ⏱️ In the top 10% by speed

      I played https://squaredle.com 04/10:
      *43/43 words (+7 bonus words)
      ⏱️ In the top 8% by speed
      🔥 Solve streak: 236

  11. Sensei

    The consumer-price index, a measure of goods and services prices across the economy, rose 3.5% in March from a year earlier, the Labor Department said Wednesday. That was a touch higher than economists had forecast and a pickup from February’s 3.2%…

    Excluding volatile food and energy categories, so-called core prices rose 3.8% from a year earlier. Of particular interest to investors and economists who care mostly about recent trends, the increase in core prices was 0.4% over a one-month period. That was above economists’ expectations for a 0.3% gain. It matched the increases of the previous two months, which had also topped forecasts.

    I’ve been told by Joe that inflation is down!

    • The Other Kevin

      Strongest recovery ever!

  12. db

    We’re Now Spending More On Debt Interest Than Defense

    this is fine

    Won’t it be a wonderful thing when the US Government has to hold a bake sale to pay for its debt interest, and the DoD gets all the money it needs?

    • Brochettaward

      I was listening to an Art Bell episode from 2004 on the economic problems facing the country. The analyst he had on spoke about the debt and the numbers being thrown around seemed quaint. He somewhat predicted the housing bubble collapsing and the price of oil being on a permanent upward trajectory.

  13. db

    Biden Could Be Left off Alabama’s General Election Ballot if Key Deadline Is Missed

    It’s my recollection that this was all predicted when the DNC started fucking around with their primary schedule, but they thought they could simply bulldoze through.

    Well, now that Biden’s not popular, it’ll get noticed more. He’ll still get on the ballots because of special pleading.

    • Pine_Tree

      Yeah they’re quite certainly counting on getting on Alabama and Ohio just by virtue of the courts having abandoned the whole “…nation of laws…” thing. And they’re probably right, and it will be one more example of rubbing everyone’s noses in it.

      I don’t actually think that was the plan, though. Sounds like plain administrative incompetence. You’d really think that an org as big and well-funded as the DNC would have some hard-core and competent managers/administrators to keep all their ducks in a row, and not be foolish enough to staff THEIR OWN org with DEI hires in critical roles. But maybe not…

      • Zwak says the real is not governable, but self-governing.

        It took the Soviets almost losing WWII to remove political commissars from the Red Army.

      • slumbrew

        DEI hires are more like zampolits than commissars. Not directly in charge, no, but “we need to talk about that new policy you’re proposing…”

  14. Derpetologist

    It’s possible that Sheila Jackson Lee and others say stupid things on purpose to get attention. That idea violates Hanlon’s razor though.

    If there are stupid voters, then it follows there will be stupid politicians.

    • Not Adahn

      Eh, there was the “Stray Voltage” concept back during the Golden Age of Obama. I don’t see how it would apply here (though if it was used successfully I wouldn’t (but I can’t believe SJL could engage in any kind of subtlety.))

    • Social Justice is Neither

      Makes sense if you view politics as a sport. I’m assuming Lee is operating under the assumption her media coverage will be treated like basketball fouls where often it’s not the initial foul being highlighted but the reaction. So she can say stupid shit and nobody notices but react to it and you’re an evil white racist picking once champion for Black Americans.

  15. DrOtto

    NPR – National Propaganda Radio. The name says it all.

    • Grummun

      I prefer “National Pinko Radio.”

  16. juris imprudent

    But how is this possible? Democrats have assured the public time and again that universal mail-in balloting is totally safe and secure.

    Easy, the Republicans are threatening to level the playing field.

    • Ownbestenemy

      That was my thought too.

  17. Brawndo

    “We’re Now Spending More On Debt Interest Than Defense, Report Finds”

    So we’re finally giving the MIC the finger and ending foreign intervention? Right?

    • juris imprudent

      #1 SS/MC, a fairly distant #2 Interest and #3 Defense/Intel

      Pretty sure that just those 3 are enough to keep the budget in deficit.

  18. The Late P Brooks

    “Prove my humanity”?

    What the fuck now?

    • UnCivilServant

      Sounds like something a Lizard Person would say.

  19. Certified Public Asshat

    You know the stereotype of the NPR listener: an EV-driving, Wordle-playing, tote bag–carrying coastal elite. It doesn’t precisely describe me, but it’s not far off. I’m Sarah Lawrence–educated, was raised by a lesbian peace activist mother, I drive a Subaru, and Spotify says my listening habits are most similar to people in Berkeley.

    No one will accuse you of having any self awareness.

    • Certified Public Asshat

      I fit the NPR mold. I’ll cop to that.

      Damn, he got me.

  20. The Late P Brooks

    Mag dump mayhem

    Newly released bodycam footage reveals the mayhem that unfolded in a residential neighborhood when Chicago police fired as many as 96 bullets toward a man during a traffic stop, killing the 26-year-old and raising questions about whether officers used excessive force.

    While a preliminary investigation suggests the driver opened fire on officers first, his family and attorneys question why plain-clothed officers swarmed Dexter Reed’s car with guns drawn and fired dozens of shots at him.

    The fatal encounter happened in the city’s Garfield Park neighborhood on March 21. Several graphic bodycam videos were released Tuesday by Chicago’s Civilian Office of Police Accountability.

    ——-

    Dozens of gunshots are then heard in rapid succession.

    Other bodycam videos show at least two other officers firing toward Reed from across the street in the residential neighborhood. Both of those officers paused to reload their guns.

    After the barrage of gunfire ends, Reed’s body is found lying face down behind the vehicle.

    “He started shooting at us,” an officer said in one of the videos.

    ——-

    “Preliminary reports indicate that this incident began when five Chicago Police officers assigned to an 11th District tactical unit engaged in a traffic stop of Dexter Reed, Jr. for purportedly not wearing a seatbelt,” the Civilian Office of Police Accountability said in a statement Tuesday.

    Trained professionals.

    • juris imprudent

      Five officers? In a single squad car (as you would expect for a traffic stop)? Was it a clown car with lights and siren?

      • Ownbestenemy

        Ya more to that ‘it was for not wearing a seat-belt’ or at least I hope.

      • slumbrew

        I’m going to guess an “anti-crime” unit, cruising around in a van.

        You will be shocked, shocked I say, to learn that such units have previously been caught doing all sorts of illegal things. Almost like they were some sort of gang.

      • Ownbestenemy

        Modern day highwaymen with funding from the local barons.

      • juris imprudent

        We are not a gang – we got badges!

      • Grummun

        Well, in other cities, perhaps, but surely not in Chicago.

      • Zwak says the real is not governable, but self-governing.

        Remember the Night Riders in Oakland?

      • Nephilium

        More and more traffic stops start with a call for backup.

        For officer safety.

    • Drake

      Racist of course, but he could have just complied with the police. I believe the guy was a convicted felon and probably already known to the cops.

      The one video I saw sure looks like he shot at the cops first. Not that it will matter any more than George Floyd dying of an overdose.

      The cops need some serious marksmanship training.

  21. juris imprudent

    There’s the media slamming Joe and in the bag for Trump, again!

    The consumer price index accelerated at a faster-than-expected pace in March, pushing inflation higher and likely dashing hopes that the Federal Reserve will be able to cut interest rates anytime soon.

    • Zwak says the real is not governable, but self-governing.

      So, reality has a Trump bias?

  22. juris imprudent

    You know if we didn’t have the stupid winner-take-all at the state level, say if that was just the two Senatorial votes at stake, and ALL of the Congressional electoral votes were by district – we’d be pretty close to a popular vote basis. So I’d rather see Nebraska-style all over instead of CA/TX.

    • UnCivilServant

      Did you hear? Nebraska is moving towards Winner Take All.

      I’d have to double-check where the legislation stands at the moment, but last I knew, there was no significant roadblocks to its passage and implementation.

      • juris imprudent

        Right because the fucking Republicans don’t want to concede that one electoral vote.

  23. The Late P Brooks

    “Dexter was pulled over for failing to wear his seat belt. Now this leaves many, many questions,” attorney Steven Hart said. “Why were tactical officers jumping out of an unmarked police car with their guns drawn for a simple traffic violation of not wearing a seatbelt?”

    It was a mob hit.

    • R C Dean

      I remember when the seat belt laws were first passed, they pinky-swore it would only be a secondary offense and you’d never get pulled over for it.

      • db

        And income tax is just for the super-rich people.

        And car registration is just for the super-rich car owners.

        And gun registration is just so we can track down criminals.

  24. EvilSheldon

    Good morning, good morning!

    I’m freshly returned from my little road trip out to Indiana for some eclipse-watching (awesome!), followed by watching the first basketball game in twenty years that I’ve cared about (not awesome.)

    And I just was awarded my blue belt in BJJ on Saturday, so that was pretty cool.

    It’s been a good long weekend. Now I need another one.

    • R.J.

      Excellent. I took a few days’ off for the eclipse as well. Looked great just from my house. It was oddly relaxing, like watching the 4th of July.

      • EvilSheldon

        My Dad and I found a good viewing spot at a rest stop on I-65, just north of Columbus, IN. The weather was perfect. And yeah, it did have a bit of Independance-Day-picnic feel to it. Might have been a midwestern thing.

  25. The Late P Brooks

    Child abuser

    Ebony Parker, a former elementary school assistant principal in Virginia where a six-year-old student shot his teacher, has been indicted in the case.

    A special grand jury in Newport News, Va. has charged Parker, 39, with eight counts of child abuse, records unsealed Tuesday show.

    She was charged on March 11 with child abuse and reckless disregard for human life, a class six felony, according to records.

    ——-

    Under state law, a parent, guardian or person responsible fore the care of a child under the age of 18 who willfully or due to “willful omission” permits serious injury to the life and health of a child and is “so gross, wanton, and culpable as to show reckless disregard for human life” is guilty of a Class 6 felony.

    Sounds like an innovative application of law, but after that Michigan case, it’s open season on aiders and abetters.

    • juris imprudent

      Last June, Deja Taylor, the boy’s mother, pleaded guilty to one count of being an illegal drug user while possessing a firearm and one count of making a false statement on a federal form to purchase the firearm. She was later sentenced to 21 months in prison for using marijuana while owning a firearm.

      Doesn’t VA have a “safe storage” law? Why the stupid federal charges instead of that?

      As for Parker, maybe everyone wants to criminally sacrifice her to moot the civil case from Zwerner?

    • Brochettaward

      this is why you’ll never see federal marijuana laws go away. The ability to selectively prosecute people is too valuable.

  26. juris imprudent

    So much for hoping for nuclear winter. Climate change – there really isn’t anything it can’t do!

    • Grummun

      Turns out that nuclear deterrence is founded in white privilege. I had no idea.

      • R C Dean

        Welp, I guess to overcome our white privilege, we need to have global thermonuclear war, or something.

  27. The Late P Brooks

    Tragic

    Tennessee Senate Republicans passed legislation Tuesday that would allow public K-12 teachers and school staff to carry concealed handguns on school grounds — despite vocal protests from Covenant School families, their supporters and others seeking stricter gun-control measures.

    The measure passed in a 26-5 vote that fell along party lines. Discussion over the bill halted as a group of around 200 gun-reform advocates voiced their opposition in the Senate gallery. Several were holding signs, and the crowd reacted by snapping their fingers in support or hissing in dissent as Senators debated the bill. Some spoke out during the early parts of the discussion.

    After repeated warnings about disruptions, Lt. Gov. Randy McNally, R-Oak Ridge, called for state troopers to clear the gallery. He permitted a group of mothers of Covenant School students to stay, saying they had not caused a disruption.

    ——-

    Beth Gebhard, whose son and daughter attend the Covenant School in Nashville, said her children were there last spring as a shooter killed three 9-year-olds and three adult staff members. She watched the Senate proceedings Tuesday with tears in her eyes, alongside several other mothers of students at the school.

    She staunchly opposes the bill. She said her children, 9-year-old Ava and 12-year-old Hudson, survived the shooting because of well-trained teachers and police officers doing their job. She can’t imagine a teacher having to also deal with confronting a shooter, especially one armed with an assault-style rifle.

    “A handgun will do nothing against that,” she said. “If what had happened on March 27 had gone down the way that it did with a teacher armed with a handgun attempting to put the perpetrator out, my children would likely be dead.”

    Millions for tribute, not one penny for defense.

    • EvilSheldon

      “A handgun will do nothing against that,” she said. “If what had happened on March 27 had gone down the way that it did with a teacher armed with a handgun attempting to put the perpetrator out, my children would likely be dead.” Depends on who has the handgun, wouldn’t it? If I couldn’t handle one psychopathic teenager with a Kel-Tec Sub-2K with my carry pistol, I’ve been doing something very wrong this past twenty years…

      • R C Dean

        I swear I remember a young man with a handgun taking down a shooter armed with a rifle in a mall, from 40 freaking yards away.

    • Not Adahn

      She can’t imagine a teacher having to also deal with confronting a shooter, especially one armed with an assault-style rifle.

      “A handgun will do nothing against that,” she said. “If what had happened on March 27 had gone down the way that it did with a teacher armed with a handgun attempting to put the perpetrator out, my children would likely be dead.”

      Relevant: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vR_5Ht69xCo

      And someone more literarily inclined than me needs to let me know what genre this is — a piece of commentary disguised as something else entirely which will be completely unrecognizable to people without background knowledge of the event being commented upon.

  28. The Late P Brooks

    “As mothers of survivors, all we can do is continue to show up and keep sharing our stories and hope that eventually they will listen to them and take our advice,” Alexander said. “We have real experiences in these tragedies. We are the ones who have been there, experienced this and lived through the aftermath of it.”

    Teach our children to be helpless.

    • EvilSheldon

      Being a bystander is not ‘experience’. Sorry to take away your reason for living, Alex…

      • Brochettaward

        I mean, they weren’t even bystanders. Just relatives of bystanders or victims.

      • Not Adahn

        How DARE you infringe on David Hogg’s business!

      • EvilSheldon

        Easily, that’s how. Easily and with great enjoyment.

  29. The Late P Brooks

    They now plan to turn their attention to the House version in an attempt to make some headway. Alexander said they’re deeply concerned parents could be kept in the dark about whether or not there is a firearm kept in their child’s classroom.

    “That’s a pretty difficult thing as a parent, not to know who your child is going to be around that’s going to have a gun,” Alexander said.

    Don’t you trust teachers? I guess you believe that gun is going to escape and kill your babies all on its own.

    • UnCivilServant

      To be honest, I don’t trust teachers. Mostly because a lot of them are insane.

    • Shpip

      This legislation is purely symbolic, of course. No schoolmarm is going to jump through all the hoops of an “enhanced carry license,” because for all their faults, they have the self-awareness to know that they shouldn’t be trusted with anything more lethal than one of those huge round pencils that they give to kindergarteners.

    • R C Dean

      I, for one, am excited about having raw gasoline dripping on my engine. That’s just good engineering.

  30. Sensei

    Paging Mr. Dean

    Mom endures ‘intensive’ chemo after terminal diagnosis that left her saying goodbye — only to find out she never had cancer at all
    https://nypost.com/2024/04/09/lifestyle/mom-given-months-to-live-endures-aggressive-chemo-but-never-had-cancer-at-all/

    “I saw the nurse practitioner first and she just asked me about my symptoms and she was scrolling on the computer while she was talking to me,” Monk recalled.

    “All of a sudden she just stops talking and has this look on her face. She turned to me and looked completely horrified and told me she needed to get the doctor and then ran out of the room. She left me alone for about 15 minutes and the doctor came back in. He said a lot of medical lingo to me and then told me I didn’t have cancer.”

    I get the pathologist made a mistake and corrected it, but like when and how? Like mid treatment the nurse practitioner is just surfing the chart and goes, “Uh oh. One second!”.

    • Swiss Servator

      Somewhere, a contingency fee lawyer is heartily laughing.

      • Grummun

        Despite the fact that it was the hospital’s fault, Monk says she was unable to get any of the bills dismissed.

        You’d think someone in either Legal or Public Relations would have looked at this and said “we need to get in front of this to minimize damage.”

      • UnCivilServant

        “We provided the services being billed for.”

      • juris imprudent

        Right up there with billing for the bullet used in the execution.

      • R C Dean

        Yeah, that was always the first thing we would do – write off the bills. Not doing that is just stupid.

        My guess is bad ID of the autopsy sample, which means somebody other has undiagnosed cancer. A double whammy!

    • db

      holy shit

  31. The Late P Brooks

    From Hell’s heart I stab at thee

    Letitia James has put further pressure on Donald Trump regarding his civil fraud case by requesting that certain documents now be examined.

    In a letter sent by her office on April 9 to Judge Arthur Engoron, the New York attorney general argued that documents held by Allen Weisselberg, a former executive in the Republican’s real-estate empire, should be examined for possible fraud despite the discovery process and the trial being over, as Weisselberg has since said he committed perjury during the case.

    ——-

    The letter from James’ office said Weisselberg’s admission to perjury should be grounds to reexamine the documents. “The Court has inherent authority over any actions that would undermine the integrity of its proceedings,” the letter said.

    “Mr. Weisselberg has admitted that he perjured himself during discovery and the trial in this action. The Court is well within its authority to determine if Defendants and their counsel facilitated that perjury by withholding of incriminating documents,” it continued.

    “The potential failure to properly produce documents in a legal proceeding relevant to the valuation of Mr. Trump’s triplex plainly falls within the ambit of her authority, and certainly within the power of this Court to safeguard the integrity of its own proceedings,” the letter said.

    Meanwhile, a court has rejected the paperwork for Trump’s $175 million bond because it could not verify the financial backing of the insurance company that posted the bond.

    The court has given Trump and the insurance company, Knight Specialty Insurance, until April 15 to show financial backing for the bond.

    If they do not, James can begin enforcement proceedings against Trump’s properties by seizing his assets.

    Ahab, in the bathtub, with a harpoon.

    • Not Adahn

      Seems fishy.

    • R.J.

      Did it during grandpa’s funeral. So selfish.

      • Certified Public Asshat

        Seraphina also died that day?

  32. Common Tater

    “Biden’s crackdown on forever chemicals: ‘Historic’ new rule will force utility companies to strip cancer-causing toxins from tap water – and HALF of American homes are affected

    But water utilities took issue with the rule, saying treatment systems are expensive to install and that customers will end up paying more for water….

    Utility groups warn the rules will cost tens of billions of dollars each and fall hardest on small communities with fewer resources. Legal challenges are sure to follow.”

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-13292489/Biden-sets-limit-dangerous-forever-chemicals.html

    Still, no idea how “forever” chemicals can be inert and reactive at the same time.

    • UnCivilServant

      Because SCIENCE!

      Though I could hypothesize a mechanism by which they catalyze a different response from enzymes or otherwise interfere with reactions without actually reacting directly.

    • juris imprudent

      inert and reactive at the same time

      CLYMUT CHANGE!!!

  33. Sensei

    President Biden used an interview with Spanish-language broadcaster Univision that aired Tuesday to send a massive signal that he plans to issue an executive order to dramatically limit the number of asylum-seekers who can cross the southern border.

    And he could only do this now? And now suddenly it can be done without Congress passing new legislation? I’m just so confused…

    https://www.axios.com/2024/04/10/biden-border-executive-order-immigrants-asylum-limit

    • Sean

      He’s “going to try”. Then fail and blame Trump.

    • juris imprudent

      Getting the announcement out now that the door will be closing in the future.

  34. The Late P Brooks

    Devastating

    The law that prosecutors used to charge the men was passed after the collapse of energy trading firm Enron in 2001 and crafted to limit accounting corruption. But the charge was used to prosecute some January 6 rioters in place of charging sedition or insurrection violations.

    The legality of using the obstruction charge has mostly been upheld by January 6 trial judges, but two judges, one Trump-appointed, have argued that it applies only to tampering or destruction of evidence.

    In 2021, one of those federal judges, Randolph Moss, said the government could face a “constitutional vagueness problem” if it could not articulate to the courts how the charge distinguished between obstruction of Congress and ordinary trespassing.

    If the supreme court decides the obstruction charge was not suitable for the January 6 rioters, the decision could also affect the election interference case against Donald Trump.

    Retired US district judge Thomas F Hogan, who passed sentence on 26 January 6 defendants, told Georgetown law school students earlier this year that if the supreme court rejects the use of the law it “would have a devastating effect on the prosecution side” of January 6 prosecutions that didn’t involve violence.

    This could delegitimize our show trials!

    • Common Tater

      The picture of Confederate flag is a nice touch.

    • Common Tater

      “2. We are unafraid to say plainly that US democracy is facing a unique historic threat. Instead of obsessing over who’s up and who’s down in the polls, our journalists are acutely focused on the stakes of this election: the fact that the fate of our democracy and our planet are on the line.”

      OK, then.

    • R C Dean

      Fortunately, this won’t get sorted out until too late to matter.

  35. Common Tater

    “Hairy-chested transgender mayor Raul Ureña who favors low-cut dresses faces recall after pride flag-raising ceremony where woman screamed ‘He’s not a woman!’

    The city’s population of about 38,000 is largely made up of mostly Democrat voters – but from the 2016 to the 2020 election, Republican voters increased from under 10 percent to almost 27 percent.”

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-13292781/raul-urena-transgender-mayor-calexico-california-faces-recall.html

    “Hairy-chested transgender”

    • Brochettaward

      People who fancy themselves serious individuals voted for that freakshow to have power.

      • Certified Public Asshat

        We must protect democracy.

  36. The Late P Brooks

    Undermine confidence in the system?

    The early release of some convicted Jan. 6 rioters ahead of a pivotal Supreme Court ruling could wreak havoc on the legal system, according to a new analysis.

    ——-

    Should the justices shut down the statute, it could prove drastic, Hsu concludes, and points to a comment from retired U.S. District judge Thomas F. Hogan.

    “A full rejection by the court ‘would have a devastating effect on the prosecution side’ in Capitol attack felony cases that don’t otherwise involve violence,” Hsu wrote.

    We cannot permit the corrupt politicization of these cases to be acknowledged. People might get the wrong idea. They might begin to suspect we’re not entirely honest.

  37. whiz

    “A full rejection by the court ‘would have a devastating effect on the prosecution side’ in Capitol attack felony cases that don’t otherwise involve violence,” Hsu wrote.

    He says that like it’s a bad thing.