Would mandated kidney donations be Constitutional?

by

by Ugh

Suppose State X passes a law providing "all individuals meeting the living kidney donor criteria* shall donate one of their kidneys to any discovered matching recipient in need and any individual refusing to donate shall be subject to a sentence of no more than Y years in prison."

Such a law would be consistent with similar laws imposing a duty to act or suffer state imposed civil/criminal punishment: (i) conscription in the Army; (ii) registration for the Draft; and (iii) mandatory reporting for, e.g., teachers, school administrators, therapists (see also Butler v. Perry, 240 U.S. 328).  

What, if anything, in the Constitution would bar a State from passing and enforcing that law?  

*Other than being willing, of course

394 thoughts on “Would mandated kidney donations be Constitutional?”

  1. “Y” being equal to the maximum criminal punishment in State X for abortion-related crimes, of course.

  2. “Y” being equal to the maximum criminal punishment in State X for abortion-related crimes, of course.

  3. In your examples, the law imposed impacts society at large and in the case of conscription, an existential threat to the entire concept of national sovereignty. In the case of teachers, the theoretical impact is an entire generation of people. In the kidney example, the imposition would benefit unfortunate individuals, not the broader society as a whole. While it may be a lot of individuals, its seems to me a different concept.
    Having said that, an interesting thought experiment, though perhaps a better thought experiment would be the requirement of giving blood. Similarly benefitting individuals, but requiring a less extreme sacrifice for the individuals making it seem more plausible but presenting the same thorny issues.

  4. In your examples, the law imposed impacts society at large and in the case of conscription, an existential threat to the entire concept of national sovereignty. In the case of teachers, the theoretical impact is an entire generation of people. In the kidney example, the imposition would benefit unfortunate individuals, not the broader society as a whole. While it may be a lot of individuals, its seems to me a different concept.
    Having said that, an interesting thought experiment, though perhaps a better thought experiment would be the requirement of giving blood. Similarly benefitting individuals, but requiring a less extreme sacrifice for the individuals making it seem more plausible but presenting the same thorny issues.

  5. Well, these limits on who could donate would offend libertarian, Christian, constitutional originalist conservative principles, leading, I expect, to violence from the politically malignant offended among us:
    “Are an incompatible cross-match (you are not compatible based on antibodies)
    Have a body mass index (BMI) greater than 30
    Have high blood pressure
    Have a history of kidney stones
    Have an incompatible blood type
    You cannot be a live donor if you:
    Are under age 18
    Have heart disease, diabetes or cancer
    Have chronic kidney problems
    Have any conditions that may jeopardize your health by kidney donation (e.g., pregnancy, being underweight, etc.)
    Rand Paul and Marjorie Taylor Thomas and Vlad Putin and any number of diseased FOX News personalities infected with Covid 19 and perhaps diagnosed with kidney cancer as well would march right into the hospital and demand the freedom to transmit those diseases via their kidney donation to kidney transplant recipients.
    They would be proud to demonstrate the free speech and freedom of assembly of their constitutionally acquired and transmitted cancer cells and spikey Covid virus, which they think of as their pre-born and pre-death offspring:
    https://www.ksat.com/news/texas/2022/04/14/the-most-hated-conservative-college-student-in-the-state-how-a-unt-student-embroiled-her-campus-in-a-culture-war/
    And there’ll be none of this forced mandated mask wearing for the patients or the hospital staff during the transplant procedures at either end of the transactions or dammit, we’ll bring this plane down, thrash and kick over the heart monitors and the IV poles, and when we get outta here, we’ll shut down every polling/voting place within a hundred miles of a black person, so help us Rod Dreher.
    And, no, we will not remove our weapons during the procedures.
    Look, kidneys are people too. Do a workaround with that minimally-evasive scalpel. I weigh 548 pounds but you go get that kidney sawbones, with yer college boy elitist degree, because there is nothing in the Constitution.
    So, in a word, problematic.

  6. Well, these limits on who could donate would offend libertarian, Christian, constitutional originalist conservative principles, leading, I expect, to violence from the politically malignant offended among us:
    “Are an incompatible cross-match (you are not compatible based on antibodies)
    Have a body mass index (BMI) greater than 30
    Have high blood pressure
    Have a history of kidney stones
    Have an incompatible blood type
    You cannot be a live donor if you:
    Are under age 18
    Have heart disease, diabetes or cancer
    Have chronic kidney problems
    Have any conditions that may jeopardize your health by kidney donation (e.g., pregnancy, being underweight, etc.)
    Rand Paul and Marjorie Taylor Thomas and Vlad Putin and any number of diseased FOX News personalities infected with Covid 19 and perhaps diagnosed with kidney cancer as well would march right into the hospital and demand the freedom to transmit those diseases via their kidney donation to kidney transplant recipients.
    They would be proud to demonstrate the free speech and freedom of assembly of their constitutionally acquired and transmitted cancer cells and spikey Covid virus, which they think of as their pre-born and pre-death offspring:
    https://www.ksat.com/news/texas/2022/04/14/the-most-hated-conservative-college-student-in-the-state-how-a-unt-student-embroiled-her-campus-in-a-culture-war/
    And there’ll be none of this forced mandated mask wearing for the patients or the hospital staff during the transplant procedures at either end of the transactions or dammit, we’ll bring this plane down, thrash and kick over the heart monitors and the IV poles, and when we get outta here, we’ll shut down every polling/voting place within a hundred miles of a black person, so help us Rod Dreher.
    And, no, we will not remove our weapons during the procedures.
    Look, kidneys are people too. Do a workaround with that minimally-evasive scalpel. I weigh 548 pounds but you go get that kidney sawbones, with yer college boy elitist degree, because there is nothing in the Constitution.
    So, in a word, problematic.

  7. I believe Amy Coney Barrett would, out of the kindness of her heart, and I do believe she is a kind, good mother, have given all seven of her kidneys, each to each of her seven children WHEN they were fetuses, but would only feel compelled by law and biology to give one of her kidneys to one of the seven, should they need it, now that they are out amongst us, and besides there is an afterlife, so the other six can wing it.

  8. I believe Amy Coney Barrett would, out of the kindness of her heart, and I do believe she is a kind, good mother, have given all seven of her kidneys, each to each of her seven children WHEN they were fetuses, but would only feel compelled by law and biology to give one of her kidneys to one of the seven, should they need it, now that they are out amongst us, and besides there is an afterlife, so the other six can wing it.

  13. It’s an interesting comparison, giving the mortality rates for pregnancy and the year after birth are not greatly different for those for living kidney donation.

  14. It’s an interesting comparison, giving the mortality rates for pregnancy and the year after birth are not greatly different for those for living kidney donation.

  15. In the past, I have occasionally asked “originalists” whether the Constitution gives me the right to donate a kidney, if I want to.
    Now, ugh wisely asks whether The Government has the power to make me donate a kidney, if I don’t want to. I bet “originalists” would assert that the Federal government doesn’t have that power, but any State government does.
    Of course, no “originalist” would ever concede a parallel between forced kidney donation and forced pregnancy-to-term. For one thing, the former can be an imposition on manly MAGAts as well as on young women, so …
    Speaking of abortion, it’s not abortion per se that makes me wish there were a hell for the so-called souls of Alito and his fellow lying god-botherers to spend their eternal afterlife in. I’m too old and male for abortion access to be important to me personally. In my remaining years, I’m not even likely to get a woman pregnant unintentionally.
    My nieces, now in their 20s, surely feel differently. I don’t know whether their generation will care enough to rise up and Abort the Court, but I figure they (and not we) will be the ones to do it. Or lump it, if they can’t be bothered.
    No, as I have said before, it’s not abortion that will make me man the barricades — it’s the “right to die”. Or “assisted suicide”, if you prefer. I can’t imagine wanting to snuff myself unless and until I am too incapacitated to do it on my own. It’s possible the God of Abraham will have gathered the Alitos unto Himself by then, but I can’t count on it. And the same “legal reasoning” that forbids women to abort a pregnancy would surely forbid me to check out before a loving Jesus has had His fill of suffering from me.
    Sex is fun to argue about, but death affects more people. Abort the Court.
    –TP

  16. In the past, I have occasionally asked “originalists” whether the Constitution gives me the right to donate a kidney, if I want to.
    Now, ugh wisely asks whether The Government has the power to make me donate a kidney, if I don’t want to. I bet “originalists” would assert that the Federal government doesn’t have that power, but any State government does.
    Of course, no “originalist” would ever concede a parallel between forced kidney donation and forced pregnancy-to-term. For one thing, the former can be an imposition on manly MAGAts as well as on young women, so …
    Speaking of abortion, it’s not abortion per se that makes me wish there were a hell for the so-called souls of Alito and his fellow lying god-botherers to spend their eternal afterlife in. I’m too old and male for abortion access to be important to me personally. In my remaining years, I’m not even likely to get a woman pregnant unintentionally.
    My nieces, now in their 20s, surely feel differently. I don’t know whether their generation will care enough to rise up and Abort the Court, but I figure they (and not we) will be the ones to do it. Or lump it, if they can’t be bothered.
    No, as I have said before, it’s not abortion that will make me man the barricades — it’s the “right to die”. Or “assisted suicide”, if you prefer. I can’t imagine wanting to snuff myself unless and until I am too incapacitated to do it on my own. It’s possible the God of Abraham will have gathered the Alitos unto Himself by then, but I can’t count on it. And the same “legal reasoning” that forbids women to abort a pregnancy would surely forbid me to check out before a loving Jesus has had His fill of suffering from me.
    Sex is fun to argue about, but death affects more people. Abort the Court.
    –TP

  17. Nobody’s stopping your kidneys from moving to a low-tax state that protects kidneys from molestation, though they will have to to get jobs and not have sexual relations with other fugitive kidneys upon pain of legal action.

  18. Nobody’s stopping your kidneys from moving to a low-tax state that protects kidneys from molestation, though they will have to to get jobs and not have sexual relations with other fugitive kidneys upon pain of legal action.

  19. What, if anything, in the Constitution would bar a State from passing and enforcing that law?
    Nothing, really. But those kidneys do have to have parental permission.

  20. What, if anything, in the Constitution would bar a State from passing and enforcing that law?
    Nothing, really. But those kidneys do have to have parental permission.

  23. At the very least it is going to be considered a taking, right?
    Also contra abortion where there are long established duties of care between parents and children, there is none such between kidney doners.
    I wonder if the focus on *rights* hasn’t rotted our democracy muscles a little bit. 2nd term abortion bans have super majority support. If you could get that for kidney mandates, we would live in a very different world. I don’t think your proposal would get 10% in any state.

  24. At the very least it is going to be considered a taking, right?
    Also contra abortion where there are long established duties of care between parents and children, there is none such between kidney doners.
    I wonder if the focus on *rights* hasn’t rotted our democracy muscles a little bit. 2nd term abortion bans have super majority support. If you could get that for kidney mandates, we would live in a very different world. I don’t think your proposal would get 10% in any state.

  25. The reason for the severe donated kidney shortage is that everyone in the donation and transplant process gets a cut of the action except for the person doing the donation.

  26. The reason for the severe donated kidney shortage is that everyone in the donation and transplant process gets a cut of the action except for the person doing the donation.

  27. Iirc in Germany it is even illegal to sell one’s own organs (as opposed to donating them). Blood is a gray area though.

  28. Iirc in Germany it is even illegal to sell one’s own organs (as opposed to donating them). Blood is a gray area though.

  29. “Y” being equal to the maximum criminal punishment in State X for abortion-related crimes, of course.
    You really should note that it is a foundational principle in this discussion that X and Y are entirely different. As in, if you don’t have a Y (chromosome) you are treated entirely differently by any law where that’s convenient.

  30. “Y” being equal to the maximum criminal punishment in State X for abortion-related crimes, of course.
    You really should note that it is a foundational principle in this discussion that X and Y are entirely different. As in, if you don’t have a Y (chromosome) you are treated entirely differently by any law where that’s convenient.

  31. (1)Contrary to the contention of the post that there are similar laws mandating a duty to act, there are no such laws.
    (2) As far as Constitutional provisions, the 14th Amendment holds “The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses,papers and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures shall not be violated” You have a right to secure your kidney against seizure.

  32. (1)Contrary to the contention of the post that there are similar laws mandating a duty to act, there are no such laws.
    (2) As far as Constitutional provisions, the 14th Amendment holds “The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses,papers and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures shall not be violated” You have a right to secure your kidney against seizure.

  33. For Janie in the Open Thread, below.
    I now do stay off your comment threads.
    As I explained, I neglected to check the title or the author of the post before commenting the other day. I had been previously avoiding that comment thread, per your druthers, and then screwed up.
    It was an honest oversight on my part. I’m sorry.
    The comments can be deleted without causing me or the cosmos any harm or loss.

  34. For Janie in the Open Thread, below.
    I now do stay off your comment threads.
    As I explained, I neglected to check the title or the author of the post before commenting the other day. I had been previously avoiding that comment thread, per your druthers, and then screwed up.
    It was an honest oversight on my part. I’m sorry.
    The comments can be deleted without causing me or the cosmos any harm or loss.

  35. … the 14th Amendment holds “The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses,papers and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures shall not be violated” You have a right to secure your kidney against seizure.
    Ah, but you see, the authors of the Constitution (including the first 10 Amendments, but no more) had no understanding of kidney transplants, and so made no explicit provisions regarding them. So the Constitution does not come into it.
    Besides, the 14th Amendment says “unreasonable searches and seizures” [emphasis added]. Would the current Court majority regard a mandated kidney donation as unreasonable? Would you care to place a small bet that they would? (Although, admittedly, it might make a difference who the donor and recipient were….)

  36. … the 14th Amendment holds “The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses,papers and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures shall not be violated” You have a right to secure your kidney against seizure.
    Ah, but you see, the authors of the Constitution (including the first 10 Amendments, but no more) had no understanding of kidney transplants, and so made no explicit provisions regarding them. So the Constitution does not come into it.
    Besides, the 14th Amendment says “unreasonable searches and seizures” [emphasis added]. Would the current Court majority regard a mandated kidney donation as unreasonable? Would you care to place a small bet that they would? (Although, admittedly, it might make a difference who the donor and recipient were….)

  39. I think the above comments about “search and seizure” refers to the *4th* Amendment, not 14th.
    The 13th, prohibiting involuntary servitude has been ignored by judicial fiat when it comes to military servitude or incubator servitude, thanks to dishonest judges ignoring the plain meaning of the words.
    Maybe they should be enslaved until they figure that whole thing out.

  40. I think the above comments about “search and seizure” refers to the *4th* Amendment, not 14th.
    The 13th, prohibiting involuntary servitude has been ignored by judicial fiat when it comes to military servitude or incubator servitude, thanks to dishonest judges ignoring the plain meaning of the words.
    Maybe they should be enslaved until they figure that whole thing out.

  41. At the very least it is going to be considered a taking, right?
    Takings are fine as long as there is just compensation. Would be interesting to apply the takings jurisprudence to the womb.
    Also contra abortion where there are long established duties of care between parents and children, there is none such between kidney doners.
    Doesn’t matter if state law provides for such a duty. See, e.g., the mandatory reporting laws (former Penn St. administrators were sentenced to between 4 and 23 months in prison for failure to report).
    2nd term abortion bans have super majority support. If you could get that for kidney mandates, we would live in a very different world. I don’t think your proposal would get 10% in any state.
    Well sure, but that’s not the point. It’s supposed to be “under litigant X’s view of constitutional law, would mandatory kidney donations be constitutional” and then comparing that answer to their view on the constitutionality of abortion bans and if the latter is okay and the former not under said view, what is the difference?

  42. At the very least it is going to be considered a taking, right?
    Takings are fine as long as there is just compensation. Would be interesting to apply the takings jurisprudence to the womb.
    Also contra abortion where there are long established duties of care between parents and children, there is none such between kidney doners.
    Doesn’t matter if state law provides for such a duty. See, e.g., the mandatory reporting laws (former Penn St. administrators were sentenced to between 4 and 23 months in prison for failure to report).
    2nd term abortion bans have super majority support. If you could get that for kidney mandates, we would live in a very different world. I don’t think your proposal would get 10% in any state.
    Well sure, but that’s not the point. It’s supposed to be “under litigant X’s view of constitutional law, would mandatory kidney donations be constitutional” and then comparing that answer to their view on the constitutionality of abortion bans and if the latter is okay and the former not under said view, what is the difference?

  43. Constitutionality aside, the policing and enforcement mechanisms for these abortion bans are going to be monstrously inhumane. Any woman who has a miscarriage in one of these states will automatically be a suspect. If the states are going to try to keep women from going out of state for abortions/abortion pills, are they going to have a border patrol? “Come join Missouri’s Border Uterus Inspection Squad!”
    Are they going have a registry of pregnant women and check up on them?
    It will be nightmarish and is already nightmarish in Texas/other states right now.

  44. Constitutionality aside, the policing and enforcement mechanisms for these abortion bans are going to be monstrously inhumane. Any woman who has a miscarriage in one of these states will automatically be a suspect. If the states are going to try to keep women from going out of state for abortions/abortion pills, are they going to have a border patrol? “Come join Missouri’s Border Uterus Inspection Squad!”
    Are they going have a registry of pregnant women and check up on them?
    It will be nightmarish and is already nightmarish in Texas/other states right now.

  47. It seems to me the best strategy is to avoid getting pregnant in the first place. These are the best ways to do that, IMO:
    1. Be born male. (I list this one first, because it requires the least effort, assuming you’ve already done that as a matter of pure luck.)
    2. Get sterilized before the onset of fertility. (There wouldn’t be any impediments to that, legal or otherwise, right? I mean, it sounds simple enough.)
    3. Avoid all contact with people who managed “1.” (There’s a lot of them out there, so you’re going to have to be very resourceful and elusive. Best of luck!)
    Freedom! Rights! Liberty!
    Feh…

  48. It seems to me the best strategy is to avoid getting pregnant in the first place. These are the best ways to do that, IMO:
    1. Be born male. (I list this one first, because it requires the least effort, assuming you’ve already done that as a matter of pure luck.)
    2. Get sterilized before the onset of fertility. (There wouldn’t be any impediments to that, legal or otherwise, right? I mean, it sounds simple enough.)
    3. Avoid all contact with people who managed “1.” (There’s a lot of them out there, so you’re going to have to be very resourceful and elusive. Best of luck!)
    Freedom! Rights! Liberty!
    Feh…

  49. Nice idea, hsh. Unfortunately, there are problems.
    #2 suffers from the fact that it would certainly be seen as a form of contraception. Which, to be fair, it is. And so, given the distinct possibility that the Court’s political hacks move on to that next, not really a solution except in the very short term. And it wouldn’t be amazing if the ban on ex post gacto laws got overturned in order to punish anyone who has done so. Even if they not only did it before the law was passed but in a state where it is still legal. Even if they were not residents, but just passing thru.
    #3 suffers from the fact that many states are passing laws with no exceptions for rape. So you would not only have to be incredibly elusive and inventive, you’d have to essentially never go to one of those states. Fine, mostly, for those already there (although “there” seems likely to contract), but hard on those too poor to decamp. And, as with #2, you also have to never pass thru one of those states, even on a plane that you never leave while it is grounded.
    And in both cases, it won’t be amazing if the laws get broadened to include anyone who ever had an abortion, even if long ago and/or in a place where it was legal. There just doesn’t appear to be any limit on these fanatics ambitions on the subject.

  50. Nice idea, hsh. Unfortunately, there are problems.
    #2 suffers from the fact that it would certainly be seen as a form of contraception. Which, to be fair, it is. And so, given the distinct possibility that the Court’s political hacks move on to that next, not really a solution except in the very short term. And it wouldn’t be amazing if the ban on ex post gacto laws got overturned in order to punish anyone who has done so. Even if they not only did it before the law was passed but in a state where it is still legal. Even if they were not residents, but just passing thru.
    #3 suffers from the fact that many states are passing laws with no exceptions for rape. So you would not only have to be incredibly elusive and inventive, you’d have to essentially never go to one of those states. Fine, mostly, for those already there (although “there” seems likely to contract), but hard on those too poor to decamp. And, as with #2, you also have to never pass thru one of those states, even on a plane that you never leave while it is grounded.
    And in both cases, it won’t be amazing if the laws get broadened to include anyone who ever had an abortion, even if long ago and/or in a place where it was legal. There just doesn’t appear to be any limit on these fanatics ambitions on the subject.

  51. Get sterilized before the onset of fertility.
    Would probably be made more difficult because of the anti-trans legislation in some places.
    Also, my wife was told that doctors usually refuse to perform sterilizations unless the patient is over the age of 35 and/or already has children because they fear being sued if the patient has second thoughts.
    So mostly 1. Because patriarchy.

  52. Get sterilized before the onset of fertility.
    Would probably be made more difficult because of the anti-trans legislation in some places.
    Also, my wife was told that doctors usually refuse to perform sterilizations unless the patient is over the age of 35 and/or already has children because they fear being sued if the patient has second thoughts.
    So mostly 1. Because patriarchy.

  53. Also, my wife was told that doctors usually refuse to perform sterilizations unless the patient is over the age of 35 and/or already has children because they fear being sued if the patient has second thoughts.
    I’m pretty sure pre-pubescent children can’t get sterilized in any case, at least not short of some dire circumstance. I guess the facetiousness of my parenthetical wasn’t apparent.
    #3 suffers from the fact that many states are passing laws with no exceptions for rape.
    What don’t you understand about “avoid all contact”? That means physical, social, and whatever other kind you can think of (telephone? USPS?). I never said it would be easy!

  54. Also, my wife was told that doctors usually refuse to perform sterilizations unless the patient is over the age of 35 and/or already has children because they fear being sued if the patient has second thoughts.
    I’m pretty sure pre-pubescent children can’t get sterilized in any case, at least not short of some dire circumstance. I guess the facetiousness of my parenthetical wasn’t apparent.
    #3 suffers from the fact that many states are passing laws with no exceptions for rape.
    What don’t you understand about “avoid all contact”? That means physical, social, and whatever other kind you can think of (telephone? USPS?). I never said it would be easy!

  55. I figured you were being deeply facetious, but given some of the other replies here that focus on feasibility rather than principles, I figured we should probably consider this argument for more than just minors.

  56. I figured you were being deeply facetious, but given some of the other replies here that focus on feasibility rather than principles, I figured we should probably consider this argument for more than just minors.

  57. In that case, nous, perhaps the calculus regarding lawsuits shifts toward greater favorability of sterilization in the face of potentially being sued after forced pregnancy and childbirth. It seems second thoughts will be coming from more and more directions in our brave, new world.

  58. In that case, nous, perhaps the calculus regarding lawsuits shifts toward greater favorability of sterilization in the face of potentially being sued after forced pregnancy and childbirth. It seems second thoughts will be coming from more and more directions in our brave, new world.

  59. “avoid all contact”? That means physical, social, and whatever other kind you can think of
    Which, realistically, means move out of state. Which, for some (mostly the same people who cannot afford to travel out of state for legal (elsewhere) abortions) is simply not feasible. Beyond “not easy”

  60. “avoid all contact”? That means physical, social, and whatever other kind you can think of
    Which, realistically, means move out of state. Which, for some (mostly the same people who cannot afford to travel out of state for legal (elsewhere) abortions) is simply not feasible. Beyond “not easy”

  61. Note that compulsory sterilization is still Constitutional in the United States under Buck v. Bell (274 U.S. 200), which I’d say is worse than having one of two healthy kidneys removed to save someone’s life. YMMV

  62. Note that compulsory sterilization is still Constitutional in the United States under Buck v. Bell (274 U.S. 200), which I’d say is worse than having one of two healthy kidneys removed to save someone’s life. YMMV

  63. Which, realistically, means move out of state.
    It doesn’t mean anything realistically. It’s satirical. It’s about the absurdity of the whole thing. And moving out of state doesn’t allow anyone to avoid males. Think federal ban.

  64. Which, realistically, means move out of state.
    It doesn’t mean anything realistically. It’s satirical. It’s about the absurdity of the whole thing. And moving out of state doesn’t allow anyone to avoid males. Think federal ban.

  65. In that case, nous, perhaps the calculus regarding lawsuits shifts toward greater favorability of sterilization in the face of potentially being sued after forced pregnancy and childbirth. It seems second thoughts will be coming from more and more directions in our brave, new world.
    I get that you’re being satirical, but I don’t think you’ve grasped the thing you’re trying to satirize quite fully enough.
    Read this, remember who we’re dealing with (people who are concerned, in the draft of a Supreme Court opinion, about the “domestic supply of infants”), and rethink your notions of how easy it’s going to be for a woman to get herself sterilized.
    Our bodies, in the view of the people trying to take complete charge of them, are, and I repeat myself, not ours.
    PS In “fairness,” the history of the “domestic supply of infants” phrase is more complicated than a lot of online commentary has made it. But the the actual (?) complicated history isn’t any comfort. They do mean it.

  66. In that case, nous, perhaps the calculus regarding lawsuits shifts toward greater favorability of sterilization in the face of potentially being sued after forced pregnancy and childbirth. It seems second thoughts will be coming from more and more directions in our brave, new world.
    I get that you’re being satirical, but I don’t think you’ve grasped the thing you’re trying to satirize quite fully enough.
    Read this, remember who we’re dealing with (people who are concerned, in the draft of a Supreme Court opinion, about the “domestic supply of infants”), and rethink your notions of how easy it’s going to be for a woman to get herself sterilized.
    Our bodies, in the view of the people trying to take complete charge of them, are, and I repeat myself, not ours.
    PS In “fairness,” the history of the “domestic supply of infants” phrase is more complicated than a lot of online commentary has made it. But the the actual (?) complicated history isn’t any comfort. They do mean it.

  67. And you know, maybe I should revise that comment to opine that it will be white women who have a hard time getting sterilized if they want to, while women of less desirable colors (in terms of the domestic supply and all that) may have just as hard a time avoiding it in some circumstances.
    See here, which (true confessions) I have not yet read carefully.
    Underlying point: it’s their decision, not ours, either way.
    Our bodies? Our country? We’ll see.

  68. And you know, maybe I should revise that comment to opine that it will be white women who have a hard time getting sterilized if they want to, while women of less desirable colors (in terms of the domestic supply and all that) may have just as hard a time avoiding it in some circumstances.
    See here, which (true confessions) I have not yet read carefully.
    Underlying point: it’s their decision, not ours, either way.
    Our bodies? Our country? We’ll see.

  69. I get that you’re being satirical, but I don’t think you’ve grasped the thing you’re trying to satirize quite fully enough.
    It’s a bit of a problem to satirize people whose actual positions seem like satire (and farcical satire at that) to the rest of us.

  70. I get that you’re being satirical, but I don’t think you’ve grasped the thing you’re trying to satirize quite fully enough.
    It’s a bit of a problem to satirize people whose actual positions seem like satire (and farcical satire at that) to the rest of us.

  71. And have a look at Betty Cracker’s righteous rant at the top of the fold at BJ this very minute.
    I can’t even count the women I know who have had miscarriages, some more than one. I was lucky enough not to go through that, but I’ve seen the pain and grief it causes. What fun it will be to go through that in the delightful company of law enforcement in states like Texas.

  72. And have a look at Betty Cracker’s righteous rant at the top of the fold at BJ this very minute.
    I can’t even count the women I know who have had miscarriages, some more than one. I was lucky enough not to go through that, but I’ve seen the pain and grief it causes. What fun it will be to go through that in the delightful company of law enforcement in states like Texas.

  73. …and rethink your notions of how easy it’s going to be for a woman to get herself sterilized.
    I don’t think it’s going to be easy, and that comment wasn’t the (fully*) satirical part. It was specific to nous’ comment regarding doctors refusing to sterilize specifically out of fear of being sued by a subsequently regretful patient. (*I suppose the whole topic is within an at least partly satirical framework.)
    If it’s out of fear of criminal sanction or licensing removal or whatever other tricks the American Taliban (aka “GOP”) can come up with, that’s a whole other consideration for doctors to refuse.

  74. …and rethink your notions of how easy it’s going to be for a woman to get herself sterilized.
    I don’t think it’s going to be easy, and that comment wasn’t the (fully*) satirical part. It was specific to nous’ comment regarding doctors refusing to sterilize specifically out of fear of being sued by a subsequently regretful patient. (*I suppose the whole topic is within an at least partly satirical framework.)
    If it’s out of fear of criminal sanction or licensing removal or whatever other tricks the American Taliban (aka “GOP”) can come up with, that’s a whole other consideration for doctors to refuse.

  75. If it’s out of fear of criminal sanction or licensing removal or whatever other tricks the American Taliban (aka “GOP”) can come up with, that’s a whole other consideration for doctors to refuse.
    Don’t forget the existing and longstanding motivation of the godlike doctor arrogating to himself the position of knowing what’s best for the patient better than she does herself — as mentioned in the piece I linked. (“Himself” used advisedly, but I’m sure this isn’t limited to male doctors.)

  76. If it’s out of fear of criminal sanction or licensing removal or whatever other tricks the American Taliban (aka “GOP”) can come up with, that’s a whole other consideration for doctors to refuse.
    Don’t forget the existing and longstanding motivation of the godlike doctor arrogating to himself the position of knowing what’s best for the patient better than she does herself — as mentioned in the piece I linked. (“Himself” used advisedly, but I’m sure this isn’t limited to male doctors.)

  77. Get sterilized before the onset of fertility.
    Started me wondering about whether they will want to ban vasectomies? Or the use of some of the new male birth control methods coming along?

  78. Get sterilized before the onset of fertility.
    Started me wondering about whether they will want to ban vasectomies? Or the use of some of the new male birth control methods coming along?

  79. @Michael Cain — two minutes in the fever swamp of Catholic websites was two minutes too many for me, but on a quick glance it seems like the Catholic church considers vasectomies to be no different than any of sinful way of trying to thwart the deity’s plans by blocking conception.
    On the other hand, if I had a fortune to bet, I’d bet a good chunk of it that legislatures around the country will keep their dirty little hands away from men’s decisions about their own bodies….

  80. @Michael Cain — two minutes in the fever swamp of Catholic websites was two minutes too many for me, but on a quick glance it seems like the Catholic church considers vasectomies to be no different than any of sinful way of trying to thwart the deity’s plans by blocking conception.
    On the other hand, if I had a fortune to bet, I’d bet a good chunk of it that legislatures around the country will keep their dirty little hands away from men’s decisions about their own bodies….

  83. Started me wondering about whether they will want to ban vasectomies?
    But that would be constraining men!!! Surely not on the agenda. (Crafting a rationalization for this is left as an exercise to the user.)

  84. Started me wondering about whether they will want to ban vasectomies?
    But that would be constraining men!!! Surely not on the agenda. (Crafting a rationalization for this is left as an exercise to the user.)

  85. My best role here is probably just to leave this in JanieM’s capable hands. I’m glad these things are being said.

  86. My best role here is probably just to leave this in JanieM’s capable hands. I’m glad these things are being said.

  87. hsh: I’m pretty sure pre-pubescent children can’t get sterilized in any case, at least not short of some dire circumstance. I guess the facetiousness of my parenthetical wasn’t apparent.
    nous: Would probably be made more difficult because of the anti-trans legislation in some places.
    Just in case anybody (hsh or anybody else) didn’t understand the point of nous’s comment, it is that puberty blockers (when taken early to delay, or avoid puberty forever) have been found in some cases to lead to lasting infertility, a side-effect that (like the rest of the poor quality and quantity of data into their use) was not necessarily understood and not notified to the child or their parents as a possibility before the start of treatment. And of course, some people feel that pre-pubertal children are not in a position to understand what that might mean for them in later life in any case.
    (I believe that one of the other possible side effects of early usage is that the child who then goes on to cross-hormone therapy – which most do – may never experience orgasm. But this, of course, unlike fertility, would be of no concern or interest to the religious zealots trying to enforce on women the carrying to term of unwanted children.)

  88. hsh: I’m pretty sure pre-pubescent children can’t get sterilized in any case, at least not short of some dire circumstance. I guess the facetiousness of my parenthetical wasn’t apparent.
    nous: Would probably be made more difficult because of the anti-trans legislation in some places.
    Just in case anybody (hsh or anybody else) didn’t understand the point of nous’s comment, it is that puberty blockers (when taken early to delay, or avoid puberty forever) have been found in some cases to lead to lasting infertility, a side-effect that (like the rest of the poor quality and quantity of data into their use) was not necessarily understood and not notified to the child or their parents as a possibility before the start of treatment. And of course, some people feel that pre-pubertal children are not in a position to understand what that might mean for them in later life in any case.
    (I believe that one of the other possible side effects of early usage is that the child who then goes on to cross-hormone therapy – which most do – may never experience orgasm. But this, of course, unlike fertility, would be of no concern or interest to the religious zealots trying to enforce on women the carrying to term of unwanted children.)

  89. Medical decisions are messy and fraught, and often feature hard choices with long-term ramifications, some of which cannot be predicted at the outset.
    Just the sort of thing that you want legislators to decide for you, based on their own personal religious beliefs, wrapped in whatever objective-sounding pretext they think will get it past judicial review. Much more reliable than a decision made under consultation with a medical professional.
    Is that facetious? It might be facetious. (It’s facetious).

  90. Medical decisions are messy and fraught, and often feature hard choices with long-term ramifications, some of which cannot be predicted at the outset.
    Just the sort of thing that you want legislators to decide for you, based on their own personal religious beliefs, wrapped in whatever objective-sounding pretext they think will get it past judicial review. Much more reliable than a decision made under consultation with a medical professional.
    Is that facetious? It might be facetious. (It’s facetious).

  91. Is that facetious? It might be facetious. (It’s facetious).
    Nope. The word you want is fatuous. Meaning “reasoning to be expected in MAGAt campaign ads.”

  92. Is that facetious? It might be facetious. (It’s facetious).
    Nope. The word you want is fatuous. Meaning “reasoning to be expected in MAGAt campaign ads.”

  93. My best role here is probably just to leave this in JanieM’s capable hands. I’m glad these things are being said.
    Thanks nous, but I think your best role is to stick around and be your usual self. Your framing of issues like this is invaluable, and all the more right now compared to mine, because I am lit up with a useless incandescent rage that ends up in a lot of venting, and not much in the way of clearheadedness (yet) about how to go forward.

  94. My best role here is probably just to leave this in JanieM’s capable hands. I’m glad these things are being said.
    Thanks nous, but I think your best role is to stick around and be your usual self. Your framing of issues like this is invaluable, and all the more right now compared to mine, because I am lit up with a useless incandescent rage that ends up in a lot of venting, and not much in the way of clearheadedness (yet) about how to go forward.

  95. And hsh — apologies if my state of mind made it seem like I was getting on your back. That was not at all my intention.

  96. And hsh — apologies if my state of mind made it seem like I was getting on your back. That was not at all my intention.

  97. No worries, Janie. It seemed that way at first, but I figured out pretty quickly it wasn’t me, but the world we find ourselves in, that you were reacting to. We all are in our own ways. It’s a sh*t show.

  98. No worries, Janie. It seemed that way at first, but I figured out pretty quickly it wasn’t me, but the world we find ourselves in, that you were reacting to. We all are in our own ways. It’s a sh*t show.

  99. Meanwhile, so-called “conservatives” are up in arms over critical race theory and kids who don’t identify with their assigned genders and whatever other bullsh*t culture-war garbage they eat for breakfast because Tucker Carlson says so. All that oppression.

  100. Meanwhile, so-called “conservatives” are up in arms over critical race theory and kids who don’t identify with their assigned genders and whatever other bullsh*t culture-war garbage they eat for breakfast because Tucker Carlson says so. All that oppression.

  103. @Nigel — Oh, no Nigel, you’ve got it all wrong. Susan Collins can’t do wrong, she can only be wronged. And religious people should be allowed to inflict their beliefs on the rest of us whenever they like. And… And… And…
    And of course, here’s a typical headline:
    Axios
    Senate Democrats fail
    to codify Roe v. Wade
    even though all but one of the D senators voted for it, and none of the R senators did.
    Nope, it’s the Dems who failed.
    (Facetious? Satirical? … )
    (Please don’t waste pixels telling me that this is customary framing in relation to the party in the majority.)

  104. @Nigel — Oh, no Nigel, you’ve got it all wrong. Susan Collins can’t do wrong, she can only be wronged. And religious people should be allowed to inflict their beliefs on the rest of us whenever they like. And… And… And…
    And of course, here’s a typical headline:
    Axios
    Senate Democrats fail
    to codify Roe v. Wade
    even though all but one of the D senators voted for it, and none of the R senators did.
    Nope, it’s the Dems who failed.
    (Facetious? Satirical? … )
    (Please don’t waste pixels telling me that this is customary framing in relation to the party in the majority.)

  107. Me: Oh, no Nigel, you’ve got it all wrong.
    Wrote in haste. Yes, she voted against a bill that would have codified abortion rights. But you see, she didn’t *really* vote against codifying abortion rights (she has her own bill for doing that), she voted *in favor of* preserving the right of religious people and their institutions to refuse to do them. Or something like that….
    Going out for the day. Maybe for the best.

  108. Me: Oh, no Nigel, you’ve got it all wrong.
    Wrote in haste. Yes, she voted against a bill that would have codified abortion rights. But you see, she didn’t *really* vote against codifying abortion rights (she has her own bill for doing that), she voted *in favor of* preserving the right of religious people and their institutions to refuse to do them. Or something like that….
    Going out for the day. Maybe for the best.

  109. Since Susan Collins is not up for re-election til 2027, she can do whatever the hell she likes, and weasel out of it in five years.
    a decision made under consultation with a [fully informed] medical professional
    Yes, this would be the wholly desirable course.

  110. Since Susan Collins is not up for re-election til 2027, she can do whatever the hell she likes, and weasel out of it in five years.
    a decision made under consultation with a [fully informed] medical professional
    Yes, this would be the wholly desirable course.

  111. Susan Collins calls the cops to investigate “defacement of public property” after someone wrote a message in chalk on the sidewalk near her home
    hopscotch players of the world, watch out.
    susan collins is coming for you.

  112. Susan Collins calls the cops to investigate “defacement of public property” after someone wrote a message in chalk on the sidewalk near her home
    hopscotch players of the world, watch out.
    susan collins is coming for you.

  113. Strolled through a Banksy exhibit yesterday:
    https://cdn.sanity.io/images/dqllnil6/production/376608c971f3288891e2a5fffa31efed7ce423e5-1200×388.jpg?w=1920&q=65&auto=format
    That’s a portrait of Susan Collin coming at ya with what Dreher calls “soft totalitarianism” and stolen elections in perpetuity.
    nous is correct that the nation’s tax-supported government constabularies are becoming the private enlisted militias for the malignant, murderous, racist, fascist, woman-lynching conservative movement.
    Here is Alito’s and the conservative movement’s “Opinion” of Susan Collins:
    “Hale, (Alito’s originalist confidante) once wrote a long letter to his grandchildren, dispensing life advice, in which he veered into a screed against women, describing them as “chargeable unprofitable people” who “know the ready way to consume an estate, and to ruin a family quickly.” Hale particularly despaired of the changes he saw in young women, writing, “And now the world is altered: young gentlewomen learn to be bold” and “talk loud.”
    The entire thing, if you’d like to trouble yourselves:
    https://www.google.com/books/edition/A_Letter_of_Advice_to_His_Grandchildren/kvABAAAAYAAJ?hl=en&gbpv=1
    Alito’s and the entire conservative movement’s “Opinion” of Susan Collin’s marriage”
    “The so-called marital rape exemption — the legal notion that a married woman cannot be raped by her husband — traces to Hale. So does a long-used instruction to jurors to be skeptical of reports of rape. So, in a way, do the infamous Salem witch trials, in which women (and some men) were hanged on or near Gallows Hill.”
    Alito believes another originalist from back in the day, in the latter’s absolute prescience (just like English Common Law had in its possession the first drawings of semi-automatic military grade weaponry to be placed in the hands of murderous fucking conservative American citizens many hundreds of years later) fortold and blessed with their rape God’s holy imprimateur the actions of Brett Kavanaugh and his wingman’s (yeah, the Puritans and toffey-nosed Brit jurists had wingmen too) criminal actions committed against the virgin Christine Blasey Ford, who was burned as a witch by 100 million subhuman rapist lying Christian conservative murderous filth in America.
    “When a virgin is defiled,” Bracton writes, “let her defiler be punished in the parts in which he offended. Let him thus lose his eyes which gave him sight of the maiden’s beauty for which he coveted her. And let him lose as well the testicles which excited his hot lust.” The truth of the victim’s accusation would “be ascertained by an examination of her body, made by four law-abiding women sworn to tell the truth as to whether she is a virgin or defiled.”
    Last I noticed, Kavanaugh’s big swinging balls are still out walking the streets.
    THIS:
    https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/restoring-america/equality-not-elitism/alitos-draft-abortion-decision-is-brilliantly-persuasive
    Until the 18th Century, there was no support in American law to any fucking right, though shooting the Other was widely practiced until we got used to it.
    My kidneys are potentially trans because they could transition for use in both females and males as long they are free of bullet holes, a less and less likely prospect as events expire, before I distribute them.

  114. Strolled through a Banksy exhibit yesterday:
    https://cdn.sanity.io/images/dqllnil6/production/376608c971f3288891e2a5fffa31efed7ce423e5-1200×388.jpg?w=1920&q=65&auto=format
    That’s a portrait of Susan Collin coming at ya with what Dreher calls “soft totalitarianism” and stolen elections in perpetuity.
    nous is correct that the nation’s tax-supported government constabularies are becoming the private enlisted militias for the malignant, murderous, racist, fascist, woman-lynching conservative movement.
    Here is Alito’s and the conservative movement’s “Opinion” of Susan Collins:
    “Hale, (Alito’s originalist confidante) once wrote a long letter to his grandchildren, dispensing life advice, in which he veered into a screed against women, describing them as “chargeable unprofitable people” who “know the ready way to consume an estate, and to ruin a family quickly.” Hale particularly despaired of the changes he saw in young women, writing, “And now the world is altered: young gentlewomen learn to be bold” and “talk loud.”
    The entire thing, if you’d like to trouble yourselves:
    https://www.google.com/books/edition/A_Letter_of_Advice_to_His_Grandchildren/kvABAAAAYAAJ?hl=en&gbpv=1
    Alito’s and the entire conservative movement’s “Opinion” of Susan Collin’s marriage”
    “The so-called marital rape exemption — the legal notion that a married woman cannot be raped by her husband — traces to Hale. So does a long-used instruction to jurors to be skeptical of reports of rape. So, in a way, do the infamous Salem witch trials, in which women (and some men) were hanged on or near Gallows Hill.”
    Alito believes another originalist from back in the day, in the latter’s absolute prescience (just like English Common Law had in its possession the first drawings of semi-automatic military grade weaponry to be placed in the hands of murderous fucking conservative American citizens many hundreds of years later) fortold and blessed with their rape God’s holy imprimateur the actions of Brett Kavanaugh and his wingman’s (yeah, the Puritans and toffey-nosed Brit jurists had wingmen too) criminal actions committed against the virgin Christine Blasey Ford, who was burned as a witch by 100 million subhuman rapist lying Christian conservative murderous filth in America.
    “When a virgin is defiled,” Bracton writes, “let her defiler be punished in the parts in which he offended. Let him thus lose his eyes which gave him sight of the maiden’s beauty for which he coveted her. And let him lose as well the testicles which excited his hot lust.” The truth of the victim’s accusation would “be ascertained by an examination of her body, made by four law-abiding women sworn to tell the truth as to whether she is a virgin or defiled.”
    Last I noticed, Kavanaugh’s big swinging balls are still out walking the streets.
    THIS:
    https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/restoring-america/equality-not-elitism/alitos-draft-abortion-decision-is-brilliantly-persuasive
    Until the 18th Century, there was no support in American law to any fucking right, though shooting the Other was widely practiced until we got used to it.
    My kidneys are potentially trans because they could transition for use in both females and males as long they are free of bullet holes, a less and less likely prospect as events expire, before I distribute them.

  115. https://www.thedailybeast.com/crystal-masons-illegal-voting-conviction-must-be-reconsidered-texas-court-says?via=newsletter&source=CSAMedition
    You’d think in Texas where tax evasion, the crime for which her voting rights were removed, is a hobby and a profession that this woman would have been permitted to vote as many times as she wished.
    Well, she was black. That makes sense, when ya tally up other conservative movement hobbies and professions in that northern province of Mexico.

  116. https://www.thedailybeast.com/crystal-masons-illegal-voting-conviction-must-be-reconsidered-texas-court-says?via=newsletter&source=CSAMedition
    You’d think in Texas where tax evasion, the crime for which her voting rights were removed, is a hobby and a profession that this woman would have been permitted to vote as many times as she wished.
    Well, she was black. That makes sense, when ya tally up other conservative movement hobbies and professions in that northern province of Mexico.

  119. …this is customary framing in relation to the party in the majority…
    Only if they are Democrats.

  120. …this is customary framing in relation to the party in the majority…
    Only if they are Democrats.

  121. …this is customary framing in relation to the party in the majority…
    Only if they are Democrats.
    I suspect that a part of the enthusiasm for the Big Lie that the 2020 election was stolen is a desire to believe that they are, in reality, still a majority.
    Messing with the Census is another leg of the same compulsion. If you can avoid counting those outside their group, you can continue to pretend that they don’t really exist.
    And, of course, the MAGAt position on immigration is another part of the same thing. They need, desperately need, to believe that theirs is still the majority, and the majority view, in this country

  122. …this is customary framing in relation to the party in the majority…
    Only if they are Democrats.
    I suspect that a part of the enthusiasm for the Big Lie that the 2020 election was stolen is a desire to believe that they are, in reality, still a majority.
    Messing with the Census is another leg of the same compulsion. If you can avoid counting those outside their group, you can continue to pretend that they don’t really exist.
    And, of course, the MAGAt position on immigration is another part of the same thing. They need, desperately need, to believe that theirs is still the majority, and the majority view, in this country

  123. Only if they are Democrats.
    True enough.
    I suspect that a part of the enthusiasm for the Big Lie that the 2020 election was stolen is a desire to believe that they are, in reality, still a majority.
    The hoi polloi, probably yes. SCOTUS justices, Congress folks, no way. They know damned well they are not, that’s partly why they’re going to such lengths to rig elections etc.

  124. Only if they are Democrats.
    True enough.
    I suspect that a part of the enthusiasm for the Big Lie that the 2020 election was stolen is a desire to believe that they are, in reality, still a majority.
    The hoi polloi, probably yes. SCOTUS justices, Congress folks, no way. They know damned well they are not, that’s partly why they’re going to such lengths to rig elections etc.

  125. One thing the abortion obsession might go some way to explaining is the otherwise demented, determined refusal to either recognise, or be corrected on, scientific realities.
    https://twitter.com/nycsouthpaw/status/1524782858602172417
    It appears the Missouri House and Senate have passed a gag rule forbidding pharmacists from proactively questioning the efficacy of ivermectin treatment for anything. https://house.mo.gov/billtracking/bills221/hlrbillspdf/4028H.06S.pdf…

  126. One thing the abortion obsession might go some way to explaining is the otherwise demented, determined refusal to either recognise, or be corrected on, scientific realities.
    https://twitter.com/nycsouthpaw/status/1524782858602172417
    It appears the Missouri House and Senate have passed a gag rule forbidding pharmacists from proactively questioning the efficacy of ivermectin treatment for anything. https://house.mo.gov/billtracking/bills221/hlrbillspdf/4028H.06S.pdf…

  131. Does the next bill they’re voting on rename Missouri the “lie-to-me state”?
    Perhaps the “Show me . . . but I won’t believe my lying eyes” state

  132. Does the next bill they’re voting on rename Missouri the “lie-to-me state”?
    Perhaps the “Show me . . . but I won’t believe my lying eyes” state

  133. As alluded in that Twitter mess, the first woman in Missouri who effects an abortion with ivermectin will be sued, prosecuted (she could plead equine miscarriage), and jailed and her child given over to a Christian cult of cross-eyed child molesters.
    The pharmacist will be executed for holding his tongue.
    Will pharmacists in Missouri … Arkansas will be next … be required to translate the small print on the Ivermectin package into Russian for all Missourians who will be required to speak and read fluent cracker Russian, and only Russian, English being now being too contaminated from its frequent use by the OTHER in America?
    The savage violence of Civil War across America approaches apace, at full gallop.
    One of the historical charms of driving thru the countryside in the South are the frequent Civil War battlefields one comes across, one after another with little distance in between.
    One hundred years from now, how will we negotiate the enormous craters from the thermonuclear explosions of the coming Second Civil War … I guess by narrated passenger drone tour and half-life suits.

  134. As alluded in that Twitter mess, the first woman in Missouri who effects an abortion with ivermectin will be sued, prosecuted (she could plead equine miscarriage), and jailed and her child given over to a Christian cult of cross-eyed child molesters.
    The pharmacist will be executed for holding his tongue.
    Will pharmacists in Missouri … Arkansas will be next … be required to translate the small print on the Ivermectin package into Russian for all Missourians who will be required to speak and read fluent cracker Russian, and only Russian, English being now being too contaminated from its frequent use by the OTHER in America?
    The savage violence of Civil War across America approaches apace, at full gallop.
    One of the historical charms of driving thru the countryside in the South are the frequent Civil War battlefields one comes across, one after another with little distance in between.
    One hundred years from now, how will we negotiate the enormous craters from the thermonuclear explosions of the coming Second Civil War … I guess by narrated passenger drone tour and half-life suits.

  135. The deafening silence of the stockpile of military grade weaponry in the fumbling hands of Texans once again proves the pointlessness of the Second Amendment’s empty girly-boy promise to water the tree of liberty with the lilly-livered, HIV- positive blood of all hat no cattle conservative Christian patriots and to execute fascist subhuman genocidal gummint led by wheelchair cowboys and shock jock east coast outta town malignancies.
    https://www.balloon-juice.com/2022/05/12/gop-death-cult-open-thread-governor-abbot-literally-wants-babies-to-starve/
    Round ‘em up , boys! They don’t have the guts to use the firepower fer what it was meant fer.
    We can wish, but wish in one hand and shit in the other in America and see which one fills up first.

  136. The deafening silence of the stockpile of military grade weaponry in the fumbling hands of Texans once again proves the pointlessness of the Second Amendment’s empty girly-boy promise to water the tree of liberty with the lilly-livered, HIV- positive blood of all hat no cattle conservative Christian patriots and to execute fascist subhuman genocidal gummint led by wheelchair cowboys and shock jock east coast outta town malignancies.
    https://www.balloon-juice.com/2022/05/12/gop-death-cult-open-thread-governor-abbot-literally-wants-babies-to-starve/
    Round ‘em up , boys! They don’t have the guts to use the firepower fer what it was meant fer.
    We can wish, but wish in one hand and shit in the other in America and see which one fills up first.

  137. https://twitter.com/KevinMKruse/status/1525259951903543296
    Pedo-Grifters?
    Hey, toots, you wanna say that to my face?
    I remember an America in which you could sit down for a quiet drink and civil conversation with your equals, perhaps colleagues, even, in a bar, or say, the hallowed halls of government, and ya know, work out your problems over heah thru face to face deliberation, give a little here, give a little there, pretty soon, everybody has their share of the sausage:
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a2Tf4uF4MyI
    The Republican Party.
    Or America.
    Choose wisely.
    Or else.

  138. https://twitter.com/KevinMKruse/status/1525259951903543296
    Pedo-Grifters?
    Hey, toots, you wanna say that to my face?
    I remember an America in which you could sit down for a quiet drink and civil conversation with your equals, perhaps colleagues, even, in a bar, or say, the hallowed halls of government, and ya know, work out your problems over heah thru face to face deliberation, give a little here, give a little there, pretty soon, everybody has their share of the sausage:
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a2Tf4uF4MyI
    The Republican Party.
    Or America.
    Choose wisely.
    Or else.

  141. Clarence Thomas doesn’t even know the history of his own court.
    https://www.upi.com/Archives/1985/03/04/Justice-Harry-Blackmun-who-has-received-numerous-death-threats/7512478760400/
    WASHINGTON — Justice Harry Blackmun, who has received numerous death threats for writing the high court’s opinion legalizing abortion, today said he was shot at through the window of his home last Thursday night.
    In a statement issued by his office, Blackmun confirmed that one shot had been fired through the front window of his Arlington, Va., home. No one was injured, and the FBI is investigating the incident.…

  142. Clarence Thomas doesn’t even know the history of his own court.
    https://www.upi.com/Archives/1985/03/04/Justice-Harry-Blackmun-who-has-received-numerous-death-threats/7512478760400/
    WASHINGTON — Justice Harry Blackmun, who has received numerous death threats for writing the high court’s opinion legalizing abortion, today said he was shot at through the window of his home last Thursday night.
    In a statement issued by his office, Blackmun confirmed that one shot had been fired through the front window of his Arlington, Va., home. No one was injured, and the FBI is investigating the incident.…

  143. @Nigel — I’m sure there’s some reason why that’s got to be allowed for, but chalk on a sidewalk must be clamped down on. Hard.

  144. @Nigel — I’m sure there’s some reason why that’s got to be allowed for, but chalk on a sidewalk must be clamped down on. Hard.

  145. Clarence Thomas doesn’t even know the history of his own court.
    You have to remember that there is a critical difference: nasty things happening to me and mine are vastly more important/threatening that anything that has ever happened to those other guys. It is, after all, at the core of the MAGA worldview.

  146. Clarence Thomas doesn’t even know the history of his own court.
    You have to remember that there is a critical difference: nasty things happening to me and mine are vastly more important/threatening that anything that has ever happened to those other guys. It is, after all, at the core of the MAGA worldview.

  147. I remember an America in which you could sit down for a quiet drink and civil conversation with your equals, perhaps colleagues, even, in a bar, or say, the hallowed halls of government, and ya know, work out your problems over heah thru face to face deliberation
    when was that?
    in other news, Yet Another Disaffected Young White Man decided to take out his resentments toward the world at large by shooting up a grocery store. Streamed it live on Twitch, apparently. A manifesto was involved.
    13 people were shot, 11 of them black. 10 people died, including the Good Man With A Gun, the grocery store security guard, who tried to bring the dude down, but was defeated by the young man’s body armor.
    It strikes me that a country that requires security guards at its grocery stores may be overdue for some self-reflection. A head check, as it were. A look in the mirror.
    Lots of other things strike me, but I’ll leave it at that.
    I haven’t been commenting all that much of late, because I just don’t think I have all that much to say. Or, rather, I have things to say, but they’re all both obvious and of no consequence whatsoever.
    We have security guards in our grocery stores now. And they die in the line of duty.
    WT actual F.

  148. I remember an America in which you could sit down for a quiet drink and civil conversation with your equals, perhaps colleagues, even, in a bar, or say, the hallowed halls of government, and ya know, work out your problems over heah thru face to face deliberation
    when was that?
    in other news, Yet Another Disaffected Young White Man decided to take out his resentments toward the world at large by shooting up a grocery store. Streamed it live on Twitch, apparently. A manifesto was involved.
    13 people were shot, 11 of them black. 10 people died, including the Good Man With A Gun, the grocery store security guard, who tried to bring the dude down, but was defeated by the young man’s body armor.
    It strikes me that a country that requires security guards at its grocery stores may be overdue for some self-reflection. A head check, as it were. A look in the mirror.
    Lots of other things strike me, but I’ll leave it at that.
    I haven’t been commenting all that much of late, because I just don’t think I have all that much to say. Or, rather, I have things to say, but they’re all both obvious and of no consequence whatsoever.
    We have security guards in our grocery stores now. And they die in the line of duty.
    WT actual F.

  149. @russell — WT actual F indeed. I don’t think it’s possible to deprogram dozens of millions of people; I don’t know how we’re going to get out of this mess. I can’t imagine things are not going to get much worse in this country before they get what I would call better, if they ever do. I won’t be surprised if it doesn’t happen in my lifetime.
    Which grieves me enormously for my offspring, their offspring, everyone’s offspring coming along behind us old folks.
    But I have been vaguely/mildly both-sides-ed recently by someone I care deeply for, someone who basically agrees with me about (e.g.) Roe but thinks I live in a bubble. That deepens my own feeling that “I have things to say, but they’re all both obvious and of no consequence whatsoever.”
    Shorter me: wrs. For a change.

  150. @russell — WT actual F indeed. I don’t think it’s possible to deprogram dozens of millions of people; I don’t know how we’re going to get out of this mess. I can’t imagine things are not going to get much worse in this country before they get what I would call better, if they ever do. I won’t be surprised if it doesn’t happen in my lifetime.
    Which grieves me enormously for my offspring, their offspring, everyone’s offspring coming along behind us old folks.
    But I have been vaguely/mildly both-sides-ed recently by someone I care deeply for, someone who basically agrees with me about (e.g.) Roe but thinks I live in a bubble. That deepens my own feeling that “I have things to say, but they’re all both obvious and of no consequence whatsoever.”
    Shorter me: wrs. For a change.

  151. I don’t think it’s possible to deprogram dozens of millions of people; I don’t know how we’re going to get out of this mess.
    At a guess, we have an incident which motivates the MAGAts to believe that their moment (for violently seizing the government) has come. So they start several somethings around the country.
    And discover, to their amazement, that they are generally getting their asses kicked. Because there’s way too many members of the US military who take seriously their oaths to “protect and defend the Constitution of the United States.” Not everybody in the military, of course, but a substantial majority. And they have the big guns. Old saying: God fights on the side of the heaviest artillery.
    Mostly, the MAGAts decide to fade away, nursing their Lost Cause the way their ancestors did theirs. Be a lot of people dead, of course. But fewer that covid has taken down. And, since it’s disproportionately MAGAts after the first couple days, their ability to win by stealing elections is down. If it reminds you of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, well it should.

  152. I don’t think it’s possible to deprogram dozens of millions of people; I don’t know how we’re going to get out of this mess.
    At a guess, we have an incident which motivates the MAGAts to believe that their moment (for violently seizing the government) has come. So they start several somethings around the country.
    And discover, to their amazement, that they are generally getting their asses kicked. Because there’s way too many members of the US military who take seriously their oaths to “protect and defend the Constitution of the United States.” Not everybody in the military, of course, but a substantial majority. And they have the big guns. Old saying: God fights on the side of the heaviest artillery.
    Mostly, the MAGAts decide to fade away, nursing their Lost Cause the way their ancestors did theirs. Be a lot of people dead, of course. But fewer that covid has taken down. And, since it’s disproportionately MAGAts after the first couple days, their ability to win by stealing elections is down. If it reminds you of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, well it should.

  153. Yet Another Disaffected Young White Man
    ‘Terrorist’ is a politically fraught word, buy I don’t see how he’s much different from one of Al Qaeda’s murderers.

  154. Yet Another Disaffected Young White Man
    ‘Terrorist’ is a politically fraught word, buy I don’t see how he’s much different from one of Al Qaeda’s murderers.

  157. Old saying: God fights on the side of the heaviest artillery.
    Tacitus, c.100
    Deos fortioribus adesse
    The gods are there for the stronger

    Roger de Rabutin, 1677
    Dieu est d’ordinaire pour les gros escadrons contre les petits
    God is usually for the big squadrons against the small
    Voltaire, 1770
    On dit que Dieu est toujours pour les gros bataillons
    They say that God is always for the big battalions
    Voltaire, c.1740
    Dieu n’est pas pour les gros bataillons, mais pour ceux qui tirent le mieux
    God is not for the big battalions, but for those who shoot the best

  158. Old saying: God fights on the side of the heaviest artillery.
    Tacitus, c.100
    Deos fortioribus adesse
    The gods are there for the stronger

    Roger de Rabutin, 1677
    Dieu est d’ordinaire pour les gros escadrons contre les petits
    God is usually for the big squadrons against the small
    Voltaire, 1770
    On dit que Dieu est toujours pour les gros bataillons
    They say that God is always for the big battalions
    Voltaire, c.1740
    Dieu n’est pas pour les gros bataillons, mais pour ceux qui tirent le mieux
    God is not for the big battalions, but for those who shoot the best

  159. The Republican Party and conservative movement Buffalo New York operative Payton Gendron was armed and groomed, not surprisingly (though in our desperate attempts to escape the deadly gravity of this racist, conservative movement genocidal fascism pulling us into its vortex of subhuman Aryan exceptionalism and well-nurtured nihilism, WE try .. try .. to maintain our own fragile human capacity to BE surprised) and not only by the Radio Rwanda Trump-heiling Republican Party hate media (expressly created over the past 40 years precisely to bring us to this hate and murder-filled moment in history; racist killer Limbaugh has a stiffy right now saluting his jackbooted Nazi-American offspring in his crypt) but this subhuman, monstrous Harvard grad Auschwitz matron-wanna-be, just cited above for ordering (some stinking conservative will be along soon to caution us that it was only a “suggestion” protected by the First Amendment), the murder of all liberal Others because we are accused of pedophilia.
    https://www.rawstory.com/elise-stefanik-great-replacement/
    Stefanik, Carlson, the entire devil army of conservative Republican Party pig fuckers are no different than mass killer Charles Manson and his hypnotic arming and administrative grooming of the Tate and Labianca murderers.
    My government must execute all of them. Because, it will be better in the long run for a decent government to do so, otherwise no one is going to like what is coming in savage vengeance to these millions of EVIL ones.
    There will be no restraint:
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=73vRi5CS81M
    Clarence and Ginny Thomas, the originalist standard-bearers of the Republican Party’s Great Replacement Theory of Jurisprudence and Insurrection, were both wearing body armor yesterday in celebration of Gendron’s achievements in furtherance their fascist vermin cause.
    None of the six fascist Republican Party operatives and their families sitting on the Supreme Court went grocery shopping yesterday.
    How did they know?

  160. The Republican Party and conservative movement Buffalo New York operative Payton Gendron was armed and groomed, not surprisingly (though in our desperate attempts to escape the deadly gravity of this racist, conservative movement genocidal fascism pulling us into its vortex of subhuman Aryan exceptionalism and well-nurtured nihilism, WE try .. try .. to maintain our own fragile human capacity to BE surprised) and not only by the Radio Rwanda Trump-heiling Republican Party hate media (expressly created over the past 40 years precisely to bring us to this hate and murder-filled moment in history; racist killer Limbaugh has a stiffy right now saluting his jackbooted Nazi-American offspring in his crypt) but this subhuman, monstrous Harvard grad Auschwitz matron-wanna-be, just cited above for ordering (some stinking conservative will be along soon to caution us that it was only a “suggestion” protected by the First Amendment), the murder of all liberal Others because we are accused of pedophilia.
    https://www.rawstory.com/elise-stefanik-great-replacement/
    Stefanik, Carlson, the entire devil army of conservative Republican Party pig fuckers are no different than mass killer Charles Manson and his hypnotic arming and administrative grooming of the Tate and Labianca murderers.
    My government must execute all of them. Because, it will be better in the long run for a decent government to do so, otherwise no one is going to like what is coming in savage vengeance to these millions of EVIL ones.
    There will be no restraint:
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=73vRi5CS81M
    Clarence and Ginny Thomas, the originalist standard-bearers of the Republican Party’s Great Replacement Theory of Jurisprudence and Insurrection, were both wearing body armor yesterday in celebration of Gendron’s achievements in furtherance their fascist vermin cause.
    None of the six fascist Republican Party operatives and their families sitting on the Supreme Court went grocery shopping yesterday.
    How did they know?

  163. Molecular and regional civil wars have more than just the combatants’ autism in common. Their participants must also be selfless. In 1951, Hannah Arendt wrote:
    “I suspect there has never been a shortage of hate in the world; but…[by now] it had grown to become a deciding political factor in all public affairs…. This hate could not be targeted at any one person or thing. No one could be made responsible–neither the government, nor the bourgeoisie, nor the foreign powers of the time. And so it seeped into the pores of everyday life and spread out in all directions, taking on the most fantastical, unimaginable forms…. Here it was everyone against everyone else, and above all against his neighbor….
    “What distinguishes the masses today from the mob is their selflessness, their complete disinterest in their own well-being…. Selflessness not as a positive attribute, but as a lack: the feeling that you yourself are not affected by events, that you can be replaced at any time, anywhere, by someone else…. This phenomenon of a radical loss of self, this cynical or bored indifference with which the masses approached their own destruction, was completely unexpected… People were beginning to lose their normal common sense and their powers of discrimination, and at the same time were suffering from a no less radical failure of the most elementary survival instinct.”
    Arendt was writing of the period between the two world wars, describing the situation which led to the establishment of the totalitarian regimes. The relevance of her analysis to today’s situation is plain. But in contrast to the 1930s, today’s protagonists have no need for rituals, marches and uniforms, nor for agendas and oaths of loyalty. They can survive without a Fuhrer. Hatred on its own is enough. If in those days terror was the monopoly of totalitarian regimes, today it has reappeared in de-nationalized form. The Gestapo and the OGPU are superfluous when their infantile clones can do their work for them. Every car on the subway can become a miniature Bosnia. You don’t need Jews to have a pogrom; counter-revolutionaries aren’t the only elements that need cleansing. It’s enough to know that someone supports a different football club; that his greengrocer’s shop is doing better than the one next door; that he dresses differently; that he speaks a different language; that he wears a headscarf or needs a wheelchair. Not to conform is to risk death.
    Their aggression is not directed only at others, but at themselves. It is as if it were all the same to them not only whether they live or die, but whether they had ever been born, or had never seen the light of day. However huge the genetic pool of stupidity might be, it is not big enough to explain this urge to violent self-destructiveness. And the nexus of cause and effect is so obvious that any child could understand it.
    Howls of protest at the loss of jobs are accompanied by pogroms which make it obvious to any thinking capitalist that it would be senseless to invest in a place where people go in fear of their lives. The most idiotic Serbian president knows as well as the most idiotic Rambo that his civil war will turn his country into an economic wasteland. The only conclusion one can draw is that this collective self-mutilation is not simply a side-effect of the conflict, a risk the protagonists are prepared to run, it is what they are actually aiming to achieve.
    The fighters know very well that there will be no victory. They know that, eventually, they will lose. And yet they do everything in their power to up the stakes. Their aim is to debase everybody–not only their opponents, but also themselves.
    Hans Magnus Enzensberger – “Civil War”
    I think about this and Hannah Arendt’s The Origins of Totalitarianism a lot these days.
    I do not think that we will ever get the sort of confrontation that wj imagines. The fanatics will use power where they can to enforce government sponsored terror up to the state level, and where they can’t it will continue to be this sort of molecular, lone wolf executions. This will continue to be messy and indecisive.

  164. Molecular and regional civil wars have more than just the combatants’ autism in common. Their participants must also be selfless. In 1951, Hannah Arendt wrote:
    “I suspect there has never been a shortage of hate in the world; but…[by now] it had grown to become a deciding political factor in all public affairs…. This hate could not be targeted at any one person or thing. No one could be made responsible–neither the government, nor the bourgeoisie, nor the foreign powers of the time. And so it seeped into the pores of everyday life and spread out in all directions, taking on the most fantastical, unimaginable forms…. Here it was everyone against everyone else, and above all against his neighbor….
    “What distinguishes the masses today from the mob is their selflessness, their complete disinterest in their own well-being…. Selflessness not as a positive attribute, but as a lack: the feeling that you yourself are not affected by events, that you can be replaced at any time, anywhere, by someone else…. This phenomenon of a radical loss of self, this cynical or bored indifference with which the masses approached their own destruction, was completely unexpected… People were beginning to lose their normal common sense and their powers of discrimination, and at the same time were suffering from a no less radical failure of the most elementary survival instinct.”
    Arendt was writing of the period between the two world wars, describing the situation which led to the establishment of the totalitarian regimes. The relevance of her analysis to today’s situation is plain. But in contrast to the 1930s, today’s protagonists have no need for rituals, marches and uniforms, nor for agendas and oaths of loyalty. They can survive without a Fuhrer. Hatred on its own is enough. If in those days terror was the monopoly of totalitarian regimes, today it has reappeared in de-nationalized form. The Gestapo and the OGPU are superfluous when their infantile clones can do their work for them. Every car on the subway can become a miniature Bosnia. You don’t need Jews to have a pogrom; counter-revolutionaries aren’t the only elements that need cleansing. It’s enough to know that someone supports a different football club; that his greengrocer’s shop is doing better than the one next door; that he dresses differently; that he speaks a different language; that he wears a headscarf or needs a wheelchair. Not to conform is to risk death.
    Their aggression is not directed only at others, but at themselves. It is as if it were all the same to them not only whether they live or die, but whether they had ever been born, or had never seen the light of day. However huge the genetic pool of stupidity might be, it is not big enough to explain this urge to violent self-destructiveness. And the nexus of cause and effect is so obvious that any child could understand it.
    Howls of protest at the loss of jobs are accompanied by pogroms which make it obvious to any thinking capitalist that it would be senseless to invest in a place where people go in fear of their lives. The most idiotic Serbian president knows as well as the most idiotic Rambo that his civil war will turn his country into an economic wasteland. The only conclusion one can draw is that this collective self-mutilation is not simply a side-effect of the conflict, a risk the protagonists are prepared to run, it is what they are actually aiming to achieve.
    The fighters know very well that there will be no victory. They know that, eventually, they will lose. And yet they do everything in their power to up the stakes. Their aim is to debase everybody–not only their opponents, but also themselves.
    Hans Magnus Enzensberger – “Civil War”
    I think about this and Hannah Arendt’s The Origins of Totalitarianism a lot these days.
    I do not think that we will ever get the sort of confrontation that wj imagines. The fanatics will use power where they can to enforce government sponsored terror up to the state level, and where they can’t it will continue to be this sort of molecular, lone wolf executions. This will continue to be messy and indecisive.

  165. I do not think that we will ever get the sort of confrontation that wj imagines. The fanatics will use power where they can to enforce government sponsored terror up to the state level, and where they can’t it will continue to be this sort of molecular, lone wolf executions. This will continue to be messy and indecisive.
    I disagree. If both sides were falling en masse into the kind of free floating hatred that characterizes the radical right, it might be accurate. But, as far as I can see, the left definitely has its nut cases, but overall they haven’t succumbed to the insanity.
    So my guess is that we will reach the point where those outside the insane right will say: “Enough of this sh*t! We refuse to put up with it any longer!” And the power of the state, backed by the support of the majority of the population, will be directed at shutting down the radicals and the private militias and the rest of institutions of insanity. Absolutely including Fox News. (The latter maybe by something that forbids anyone working for a self-labeled news organization from defending charges of incitement by claiming that nobody with any sense would believe what he says is anything but entertainment. Although there may be a different approach employed.) And that probably includes amending the Constitution to repeal, or at least radically clarify, the 2nd Amendment. And making gun manufacturers liable for the damage done by their products in private hands.

  166. I do not think that we will ever get the sort of confrontation that wj imagines. The fanatics will use power where they can to enforce government sponsored terror up to the state level, and where they can’t it will continue to be this sort of molecular, lone wolf executions. This will continue to be messy and indecisive.
    I disagree. If both sides were falling en masse into the kind of free floating hatred that characterizes the radical right, it might be accurate. But, as far as I can see, the left definitely has its nut cases, but overall they haven’t succumbed to the insanity.
    So my guess is that we will reach the point where those outside the insane right will say: “Enough of this sh*t! We refuse to put up with it any longer!” And the power of the state, backed by the support of the majority of the population, will be directed at shutting down the radicals and the private militias and the rest of institutions of insanity. Absolutely including Fox News. (The latter maybe by something that forbids anyone working for a self-labeled news organization from defending charges of incitement by claiming that nobody with any sense would believe what he says is anything but entertainment. Although there may be a different approach employed.) And that probably includes amending the Constitution to repeal, or at least radically clarify, the 2nd Amendment. And making gun manufacturers liable for the damage done by their products in private hands.

  167. Amend the constitution how? There’s currently a 50/50 split of red vs. blue states. Good luck getting to a 2/3 majority *by state.*
    The constitution is built in a way that plays into the hands of the saboteurs, and the saboteurs are using their institutional powers to further erode any ability to self-correct.
    I believe in your sentiment, I just don’t see any mechanisms to get from sentiment to self-correction that does not in essence dissolve the constitution.

  168. Amend the constitution how? There’s currently a 50/50 split of red vs. blue states. Good luck getting to a 2/3 majority *by state.*
    The constitution is built in a way that plays into the hands of the saboteurs, and the saboteurs are using their institutional powers to further erode any ability to self-correct.
    I believe in your sentiment, I just don’t see any mechanisms to get from sentiment to self-correction that does not in essence dissolve the constitution.

  169. OT directed to Janie, any info on what’s up with Balloon Juice? I had not seen any notice of server maintenance, my paranoid side is wondering if they attracted hacking because of Adam Silberman’s daily Ukraine updates.

  170. OT directed to Janie, any info on what’s up with Balloon Juice? I had not seen any notice of server maintenance, my paranoid side is wondering if they attracted hacking because of Adam Silberman’s daily Ukraine updates.

  173. Amend the constitution how? There’s currently a 50/50 split of red vs. blue states. Good luck getting to a 2/3 majority *by state.*
    That wouldn’t be the first step, for the reasons you give. But I expect it would happen, once sanity was restored to our civil discourse.
    Then again, we might merely decide that “a well-regulated militia” means the National Guard, and not individuals. That would merely require restoring sanity on the Supreme Court. Which we will need to reestablish anyway.

  174. Amend the constitution how? There’s currently a 50/50 split of red vs. blue states. Good luck getting to a 2/3 majority *by state.*
    That wouldn’t be the first step, for the reasons you give. But I expect it would happen, once sanity was restored to our civil discourse.
    Then again, we might merely decide that “a well-regulated militia” means the National Guard, and not individuals. That would merely require restoring sanity on the Supreme Court. Which we will need to reestablish anyway.

  175. Kyle Rittenhouse was a guest of Herr Trump at Mar-a-Lago last night. And THAT’s not even the headline in this post:
    https://digbysblog.net/2022/05/15/18-year-old-gun-nuts/
    The great thing about the efficiency of modern military grade killing weaponry is one conservative gunman can take of killing the Other in Buffalo, while another can bide his time and join his genocidal brethren and view a movie about killing the Other.
    Two California subhuman fucking Judges just armed and groomed and recruited more young fascist republican vermin operative fucks to “copy that” Buffalo slaughter.

  176. Kyle Rittenhouse was a guest of Herr Trump at Mar-a-Lago last night. And THAT’s not even the headline in this post:
    https://digbysblog.net/2022/05/15/18-year-old-gun-nuts/
    The great thing about the efficiency of modern military grade killing weaponry is one conservative gunman can take of killing the Other in Buffalo, while another can bide his time and join his genocidal brethren and view a movie about killing the Other.
    Two California subhuman fucking Judges just armed and groomed and recruited more young fascist republican vermin operative fucks to “copy that” Buffalo slaughter.

  177. “Then again, we might merely decide that “a well-regulated militia” means the National Guard, and not individuals. That would merely require restoring sanity on the Supreme Court. Which we will need to reestablish anyway.”
    Wish with one hand and …. well … you know the drill.

  178. “Then again, we might merely decide that “a well-regulated militia” means the National Guard, and not individuals. That would merely require restoring sanity on the Supreme Court. Which we will need to reestablish anyway.”
    Wish with one hand and …. well … you know the drill.

  183. Certainly cancer makes a convenient excuse for a coup. Leaves the option of either letting him retire to a rest home (if he’s a good little boy and goes quietly), or putting him in a casket (if he resists). And muddys the waters with the other unrepentant KGB types.

  184. Certainly cancer makes a convenient excuse for a coup. Leaves the option of either letting him retire to a rest home (if he’s a good little boy and goes quietly), or putting him in a casket (if he resists). And muddys the waters with the other unrepentant KGB types.

  185. @Priest — I don’t know, it’s pretty weird to have two whole daytimes (and a night!) without BJ or any way to get word about what’s happening. Funny you should think of Silverman’s posts, I thought of WaterGirl’s massive efforts to raise funds for democratic and Democratic causes.
    I wish they’d put up some kind of message somehow, thought! But their hosting company is down too, so it seems to be bigger than just BJ.

  186. @Priest — I don’t know, it’s pretty weird to have two whole daytimes (and a night!) without BJ or any way to get word about what’s happening. Funny you should think of Silverman’s posts, I thought of WaterGirl’s massive efforts to raise funds for democratic and Democratic causes.
    I wish they’d put up some kind of message somehow, thought! But their hosting company is down too, so it seems to be bigger than just BJ.

  187. Thanks for the reply Janie, I thought about checking Wayback Machine to see if I could get an email address for checking directly, but hoping whatever it is gets cleared up soon.

  188. Thanks for the reply Janie, I thought about checking Wayback Machine to see if I could get an email address for checking directly, but hoping whatever it is gets cleared up soon.

  189. I happened to still have Steve’s photo post from Friday open, and hadn’t refreshed it, so I looked for their hosting company at the bottom. I do have WaterGirl’s email address because of photo correspondence, but I don’t think this is the time to interrupt her with inquiries. 🙂
    It does seem like it must be something pretty disastrous, to have caused this much downtime.

  190. I happened to still have Steve’s photo post from Friday open, and hadn’t refreshed it, so I looked for their hosting company at the bottom. I do have WaterGirl’s email address because of photo correspondence, but I don’t think this is the time to interrupt her with inquiries. 🙂
    It does seem like it must be something pretty disastrous, to have caused this much downtime.

  191. According to John Cole:
    “Balloon Juice is still down. They know what is causing the problem and have told us, and are working to fix it as it is impacting a large volume of websites including hospitals, etc.
    I don’t understand what the problem is, but I have been told.”
    John Cole @Johngcole: 11:11 AM · May 15, 2022

  192. According to John Cole:
    “Balloon Juice is still down. They know what is causing the problem and have told us, and are working to fix it as it is impacting a large volume of websites including hospitals, etc.
    I don’t understand what the problem is, but I have been told.”
    John Cole @Johngcole: 11:11 AM · May 15, 2022

  193. Thanks, Charles! I looked at BizBudding’s Twitter (and Facebook), but never thought of John’s.

  194. Thanks, Charles! I looked at BizBudding’s Twitter (and Facebook), but never thought of John’s.

  195. For that matter, ObWi has been loading very very slowly most of the time over the past couple of days, and now and then it doesn’t load at all and I get the “this website isn’t responding” page.
    Anyone else getting that? Not that it matters, sine we can’t do anything about it.

  196. For that matter, ObWi has been loading very very slowly most of the time over the past couple of days, and now and then it doesn’t load at all and I get the “this website isn’t responding” page.
    Anyone else getting that? Not that it matters, sine we can’t do anything about it.

  203. I’ve gotten hung up a couple times the past week. Shutting the tab and opening a new one seemed to help. Sometimes. Don’t know if that’s dispositive.

  204. I’ve gotten hung up a couple times the past week. Shutting the tab and opening a new one seemed to help. Sometimes. Don’t know if that’s dispositive.

  205. Same here. But this has happened occasionally in the past, so I did not think about it too much (and it was back to normal soon).

  206. Same here. But this has happened occasionally in the past, so I did not think about it too much (and it was back to normal soon).

  207. An appeals court panel ruled on Wednesday that California’s ban on the sale of semiautomatic weapons to adults under the age of 21 violated the right to bear arms found in the Second Amendment of the Constitution.
    Wasn’t the original intent that the right of the people to keep and bear muzzle-loading muskets shall not be infringed?

  208. An appeals court panel ruled on Wednesday that California’s ban on the sale of semiautomatic weapons to adults under the age of 21 violated the right to bear arms found in the Second Amendment of the Constitution.
    Wasn’t the original intent that the right of the people to keep and bear muzzle-loading muskets shall not be infringed?

  209. And the text says nothing at all about armor despite arms&armor being a standard combo. So body armor is clearly not covered (pun not intended) by the 2nd Amendment. And since all clothing can serve as that, there must be a right to bare arms, so people do not run afoul of the armor ban.
    On the other hand, how is the right to bear arms not infringed by bans on bear hunting?

  210. And the text says nothing at all about armor despite arms&armor being a standard combo. So body armor is clearly not covered (pun not intended) by the 2nd Amendment. And since all clothing can serve as that, there must be a right to bare arms, so people do not run afoul of the armor ban.
    On the other hand, how is the right to bear arms not infringed by bans on bear hunting?

  211. Perhaps we maintain the right to bear arms as including anything, but ban ammunition. Including empty shells, for the benefit of home reloaders.

  212. Perhaps we maintain the right to bear arms as including anything, but ban ammunition. Including empty shells, for the benefit of home reloaders.

  213. Iirc the supreme court has anticipated that move and declared it unconstitutional. It would be silly not to close loopholes on a right to shoot holes into things. Or – actually – natural persons. Shooting holes into things* could violate property rights.
    * which used to include humans owned by other humans. I wonder if banks could claim shot (small**) debtors as damaged property.
    **if you owe the bank enough you own the bank

  214. Iirc the supreme court has anticipated that move and declared it unconstitutional. It would be silly not to close loopholes on a right to shoot holes into things. Or – actually – natural persons. Shooting holes into things* could violate property rights.
    * which used to include humans owned by other humans. I wonder if banks could claim shot (small**) debtors as damaged property.
    **if you owe the bank enough you own the bank

  215. Shooting holes into things* could violate property rights.
    Years ago the company I worked for acquired the cable television franchise in the Atlanta, GA area from its former owner. We had to change the software that tracked trouble tickets to include “amplifier shot”. Someone shooting an analog amplifier suspended on the aerial coaxial cable was the leading cause of service outages in Atlanta.

  216. Shooting holes into things* could violate property rights.
    Years ago the company I worked for acquired the cable television franchise in the Atlanta, GA area from its former owner. We had to change the software that tracked trouble tickets to include “amplifier shot”. Someone shooting an analog amplifier suspended on the aerial coaxial cable was the leading cause of service outages in Atlanta.

  217. Not particularly serious query: does the “right to bear arms” invalidate all laws and regulations restricting the killing bears?
    With this Supreme Court, who knows what their seances would reveal about the Founders original intent….

  218. Not particularly serious query: does the “right to bear arms” invalidate all laws and regulations restricting the killing bears?
    With this Supreme Court, who knows what their seances would reveal about the Founders original intent….

  219. So if abortion is banned in FL, could a woman aborting a fetus claim self-defense under FL’s stand your ground law?

  220. So if abortion is banned in FL, could a woman aborting a fetus claim self-defense under FL’s stand your ground law?

  221. So if abortion is banned in FL, could a woman aborting a fetus claim self-defense under FL’s stand your ground law?
    If it threatened her life, for example an ectopic pregnancy, she’d have a darn good case. Although, since they have a “life of the mother” exception (so far), they’d be unlikely to bring charges. Unless they decide they’re in a competition for nastiest law, in which case they might remove all exceptions. (Wonder if, at the same time, they’ll change the “stand your ground” law to explicitly block that defense.)

  222. So if abortion is banned in FL, could a woman aborting a fetus claim self-defense under FL’s stand your ground law?
    If it threatened her life, for example an ectopic pregnancy, she’d have a darn good case. Although, since they have a “life of the mother” exception (so far), they’d be unlikely to bring charges. Unless they decide they’re in a competition for nastiest law, in which case they might remove all exceptions. (Wonder if, at the same time, they’ll change the “stand your ground” law to explicitly block that defense.)

  223. I’ve wondered before if women could defend abortion on those grounds in a state with castle doctrine laws. As property goes, there’s not much more propre than one’s own person.

  224. I’ve wondered before if women could defend abortion on those grounds in a state with castle doctrine laws. As property goes, there’s not much more propre than one’s own person.

  225. Nope, to my knowledge that is explicitly not included. At least some Jews complained about that since in Jewish theology and law an unborn that threatens the life or health of the mother is classified as a ‘rodef’, a hostile persuer, that it is fully legitimate to defend oneself against with deadly force up to the moment of birth. Once the head is outside the body of the mother, the child is considered born and has equal rights to the mother.
    Btw, during the one-child-only policy in China many kids were killed by state doctors at this very point (iirc by driving a spike into the emerging head of the ‘illegal’ baby). So, this is not just an academic question.
    The Jews in question especially complained that the figleaf of ‘Judaeo-Christian’ was used to justify the abortion ban without even consulting Jews about their actual traditions and customs.
    What they did not mention (to my knowledge at least) in this context is that the Jewish abortionist doctor is a traditional antisemitic trope. Btw, the Roman historian Tacitus accused the Jews of being fanatical anti-abortionists and came close to a ‘great replacement’ conspiracy theory.

  226. Nope, to my knowledge that is explicitly not included. At least some Jews complained about that since in Jewish theology and law an unborn that threatens the life or health of the mother is classified as a ‘rodef’, a hostile persuer, that it is fully legitimate to defend oneself against with deadly force up to the moment of birth. Once the head is outside the body of the mother, the child is considered born and has equal rights to the mother.
    Btw, during the one-child-only policy in China many kids were killed by state doctors at this very point (iirc by driving a spike into the emerging head of the ‘illegal’ baby). So, this is not just an academic question.
    The Jews in question especially complained that the figleaf of ‘Judaeo-Christian’ was used to justify the abortion ban without even consulting Jews about their actual traditions and customs.
    What they did not mention (to my knowledge at least) in this context is that the Jewish abortionist doctor is a traditional antisemitic trope. Btw, the Roman historian Tacitus accused the Jews of being fanatical anti-abortionists and came close to a ‘great replacement’ conspiracy theory.

  227. When the Chinese Communists took power they encouraged having more children. Then, after killing 60 million people, they decided they still had too many people and set the one-child-only policy with its forced abortions and forced sterilizations.
    Now that they decided there’re not enough children, they’re encouraging a higher birth rate. Which, in time, may lead to forced pregnancies and contraception and sterilization being illegal.

  228. When the Chinese Communists took power they encouraged having more children. Then, after killing 60 million people, they decided they still had too many people and set the one-child-only policy with its forced abortions and forced sterilizations.
    Now that they decided there’re not enough children, they’re encouraging a higher birth rate. Which, in time, may lead to forced pregnancies and contraception and sterilization being illegal.

  229. the Roman historian Tacitus accused the Jews of being fanatical anti-abortionists
    Did he? My recollection, backed up by several seconds’ online research, is that accused the Jews of being fanatically opposed to infanticide. Which, to be fair, they were.

  230. the Roman historian Tacitus accused the Jews of being fanatical anti-abortionists
    Did he? My recollection, backed up by several seconds’ online research, is that accused the Jews of being fanatically opposed to infanticide. Which, to be fair, they were.

  231. backed up by several seconds’ online research
    LOL. And frankly, who could ask for more, in these troubled and demanding times? Although, on past experience, I wouldn’t put it past Hartmut to come back with more, and more detailed, evidence!

  232. backed up by several seconds’ online research
    LOL. And frankly, who could ask for more, in these troubled and demanding times? Although, on past experience, I wouldn’t put it past Hartmut to come back with more, and more detailed, evidence!

  233. The Chinese Communist Party has repeatedly demonstrated its ignorance of everything from basic demographics to human nature. Makes it hard to predict what idiocy they will come up with next.
    My guess is that they will deal with their unfortunate population age distribution in the most straightforward way possible: killing off everyone (except senior Party officials, of course) past the age where they are productively employed. Or, perhaps more simple-minded and thus more likely, set some arbitrary maximum age.

  234. The Chinese Communist Party has repeatedly demonstrated its ignorance of everything from basic demographics to human nature. Makes it hard to predict what idiocy they will come up with next.
    My guess is that they will deal with their unfortunate population age distribution in the most straightforward way possible: killing off everyone (except senior Party officials, of course) past the age where they are productively employed. Or, perhaps more simple-minded and thus more likely, set some arbitrary maximum age.

  235. With very little in the way of pensions and social programs for the elderly and too few children to support them, a lot of the elderly may just die prematurely of “natural causes.”

  236. With very little in the way of pensions and social programs for the elderly and too few children to support them, a lot of the elderly may just die prematurely of “natural causes.”

  237. Pro Bono, you’re technically correct that Tacitus speaks of the killing of already born children.
    But given the terms he uses and the reason he gives, it strongly implies that he is talking about spiritually the same thing as abortion (in this case the ‘post-natal birth control’ favored by Romans and Greeks). I see the main difference in that an abortion is usually on the female’s initiative while the legal infanticide is decided on by the assumed father (with no input from the birthing female*). Again, technically any Roman kid not formally accepted by the father at birth was supposed to be done away with. The Roman and Greek patriarchy preferred infanticide over abortion because the men wanted control** (and additionally abortions could endanger the woman’s fertility). But the actual purpose was the same. Roman law made kids that were accepted by their fathers sacrosanct up to the moment they donned the toga virilis. So, Tacitus can only mean infanticide directly after birth as a method of abortion/birth control/getting rid of an unwanted child, otherwise there would have been nothing ‘immoral’ to charge the Jews with.
    I would have to look it up, if kids were considered legally as persons at all before the father lifted up the newborn that had been put before him on the ground for inspection followed by acceptance or rejection. If this was not the case, a distinction between abortion and infanticide (directly following birth) would have no meaning from the POV then.
    What’s absolutely clear is that Tacitus sees Jewish opposition to ‘not having the kid’ as part of a perfidious plan of outcompeting other peoples in population growth in order to gain power (while civilized people aimed for keeping the population numbers as constant as possible). That idea lays also at the base of modern ‘great replacement’ propaganda. Btw, it’s interesting that Tacitus also reports that the Jews were not originally a people but a collection of unrelated humans kicked out of Egypt for suffering from a disfiguring disease (and were also habitually lazy, making up their whole religion to justify that fact). The guy would feel right at home ideologically with modern antisemites.
    *as a purely technical term. Please do not confuse with the current culture war’s talking points.
    **according to Cicero the ‘crime’ of abortion was essentially theft of an heir from the father by the woman not the fact that a person was killed. The father had the undisputed right to decide over life and death, so he could order an abortion freely.

  238. Pro Bono, you’re technically correct that Tacitus speaks of the killing of already born children.
    But given the terms he uses and the reason he gives, it strongly implies that he is talking about spiritually the same thing as abortion (in this case the ‘post-natal birth control’ favored by Romans and Greeks). I see the main difference in that an abortion is usually on the female’s initiative while the legal infanticide is decided on by the assumed father (with no input from the birthing female*). Again, technically any Roman kid not formally accepted by the father at birth was supposed to be done away with. The Roman and Greek patriarchy preferred infanticide over abortion because the men wanted control** (and additionally abortions could endanger the woman’s fertility). But the actual purpose was the same. Roman law made kids that were accepted by their fathers sacrosanct up to the moment they donned the toga virilis. So, Tacitus can only mean infanticide directly after birth as a method of abortion/birth control/getting rid of an unwanted child, otherwise there would have been nothing ‘immoral’ to charge the Jews with.
    I would have to look it up, if kids were considered legally as persons at all before the father lifted up the newborn that had been put before him on the ground for inspection followed by acceptance or rejection. If this was not the case, a distinction between abortion and infanticide (directly following birth) would have no meaning from the POV then.
    What’s absolutely clear is that Tacitus sees Jewish opposition to ‘not having the kid’ as part of a perfidious plan of outcompeting other peoples in population growth in order to gain power (while civilized people aimed for keeping the population numbers as constant as possible). That idea lays also at the base of modern ‘great replacement’ propaganda. Btw, it’s interesting that Tacitus also reports that the Jews were not originally a people but a collection of unrelated humans kicked out of Egypt for suffering from a disfiguring disease (and were also habitually lazy, making up their whole religion to justify that fact). The guy would feel right at home ideologically with modern antisemites.
    *as a purely technical term. Please do not confuse with the current culture war’s talking points.
    **according to Cicero the ‘crime’ of abortion was essentially theft of an heir from the father by the woman not the fact that a person was killed. The father had the undisputed right to decide over life and death, so he could order an abortion freely.

  239. Thanks Hartmut, I’ll settle for technically correct.
    Tacitus may not have cared much about the difference between abortion and infanticide, but Jewish law, probably first written contemporaneously with Tacitus, makes an emphatic distinction – it allows abortion up to the point of birth to save the mother’s life, but forbids infanticide once the greater part of the child has emerged (Mishnah Oholot 7).

  240. Thanks Hartmut, I’ll settle for technically correct.
    Tacitus may not have cared much about the difference between abortion and infanticide, but Jewish law, probably first written contemporaneously with Tacitus, makes an emphatic distinction – it allows abortion up to the point of birth to save the mother’s life, but forbids infanticide once the greater part of the child has emerged (Mishnah Oholot 7).

  241. a perfidious plan of outcompeting other peoples in population growth in order to gain power (while civilized people aimed for keeping the population numbers as constant as possible). That idea lays also at the base of modern ‘great replacement’ propaganda.
    And possibly at the root of modern (as opposed to ancient) opposition to abortion.** Wouldn’t want mere females deciding to constrain the population of Real Americans.
    ** And why contraception may be next.

  242. a perfidious plan of outcompeting other peoples in population growth in order to gain power (while civilized people aimed for keeping the population numbers as constant as possible). That idea lays also at the base of modern ‘great replacement’ propaganda.
    And possibly at the root of modern (as opposed to ancient) opposition to abortion.** Wouldn’t want mere females deciding to constrain the population of Real Americans.
    ** And why contraception may be next.

  243. When the Chinese Communists took power they encouraged having more children. Then, after killing 60 million people, they decided they still had too many people and set the one-child-only policy with its forced abortions and forced sterilizations.
    Now that they decided there’re not enough children, they’re encouraging a higher birth rate. Which, in time, may lead to forced pregnancies and contraception and sterilization being illegal.
    Jeez, that’s bad, you mean it was exactly the same people who did that? Thank god all of our sins were done by other people in the past.

  244. When the Chinese Communists took power they encouraged having more children. Then, after killing 60 million people, they decided they still had too many people and set the one-child-only policy with its forced abortions and forced sterilizations.
    Now that they decided there’re not enough children, they’re encouraging a higher birth rate. Which, in time, may lead to forced pregnancies and contraception and sterilization being illegal.
    Jeez, that’s bad, you mean it was exactly the same people who did that? Thank god all of our sins were done by other people in the past.

  245. I’m re-reading Joyce’s Ulysses, this time with lots of critical help, but never mind you that.
    I came across this article …
    https://www.nytimes.com/2018/06/12/magazine/the-strange-case-of-the-missing-joyce-scholar.html
    ….. which reads like a pitch by Werner Herzog for a film about the obsessives HE obsesses over .. and which illustrates the critical rabbit holes Joyce scholars dive into headfirst, which Joyce himself arranged for them and predicted, but never mind you that either, though it is an entertaining tale.
    No, my point is this passage in the article …
    “In that stretch when the original edition fell out of copyright in the mid-1990s, a lot of editors rushed to publish their own editions. Some have dots, some don’t. Some with “love,” some not. Some editors reversed a selection of Gabler’s changes, some didn’t. Other editions have gone off the rails, as the Joyce scholar Sam Slote told me: One “Ulysses,” currently available online, has a long, weird riff inserted on Page 160, announcing that you will now be reading “The Secret Confessions of a Conservative,” where the anonymous writer explains that his pro-life, pro-death-penalty positions are so consistent that “if an embryo or fetus commits murder, then he should be aborted.”
    …. there you have it. A conservative libertarian crypto-religious death cult movement which has crawled up its own ass seeking a sociopathic, malign consistency and perverse fascist rationality beyond all satire and petition by the usual human methods and thinks it has recognized an ultimate perverted truth among the platonic shadows up its own shit caves and now lives there blinking in absolute certainty in the shit darkness, and the world and we are forced now to live there up conservatism’s ass as well.
    Just thought I’d share.

  246. I’m re-reading Joyce’s Ulysses, this time with lots of critical help, but never mind you that.
    I came across this article …
    https://www.nytimes.com/2018/06/12/magazine/the-strange-case-of-the-missing-joyce-scholar.html
    ….. which reads like a pitch by Werner Herzog for a film about the obsessives HE obsesses over .. and which illustrates the critical rabbit holes Joyce scholars dive into headfirst, which Joyce himself arranged for them and predicted, but never mind you that either, though it is an entertaining tale.
    No, my point is this passage in the article …
    “In that stretch when the original edition fell out of copyright in the mid-1990s, a lot of editors rushed to publish their own editions. Some have dots, some don’t. Some with “love,” some not. Some editors reversed a selection of Gabler’s changes, some didn’t. Other editions have gone off the rails, as the Joyce scholar Sam Slote told me: One “Ulysses,” currently available online, has a long, weird riff inserted on Page 160, announcing that you will now be reading “The Secret Confessions of a Conservative,” where the anonymous writer explains that his pro-life, pro-death-penalty positions are so consistent that “if an embryo or fetus commits murder, then he should be aborted.”
    …. there you have it. A conservative libertarian crypto-religious death cult movement which has crawled up its own ass seeking a sociopathic, malign consistency and perverse fascist rationality beyond all satire and petition by the usual human methods and thinks it has recognized an ultimate perverted truth among the platonic shadows up its own shit caves and now lives there blinking in absolute certainty in the shit darkness, and the world and we are forced now to live there up conservatism’s ass as well.
    Just thought I’d share.

  249. I’m re-reading Joyce’s Ulysses, this time with lots of critical help, but never mind you that.
    I tried reading Ulysses one time in college. After being assigned Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man for a class. As I told my professor, both suffered from the same problem: “Joyce simple didn’t know how to handle the English language.” He did not take it well. (Perhaps he was in denial…?)

  250. I’m re-reading Joyce’s Ulysses, this time with lots of critical help, but never mind you that.
    I tried reading Ulysses one time in college. After being assigned Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man for a class. As I told my professor, both suffered from the same problem: “Joyce simple didn’t know how to handle the English language.” He did not take it well. (Perhaps he was in denial…?)

  251. “(Perhaps he was in denial…?)”
    Perhaps, but which one of you might one day suffer from Agenbite of Inwit at the beauty you missed?
    %-}
    “Yes, the newspapers were right: snow was general all over Ireland. It was falling softly upon the Bog of Allen and, further westwards, softly falling into the dark mutinous Shannon waves. It was falling too upon every part of the lonely churchyard where Michael Furey lay buried. It lay thickly drifted on the crooked crosses and headstones, on the spears of the little gate, on the barren thorns. His soul swooned slowly as he heard the snow falling faintly through the universe and faintly falling, like the descent of their last end, upon all the living and the dead.”
    The Dead
    James Joyce
    A passage from A Portrait of the Artist As A Young Man:
    “The phrase and the day and the scene harmonized in a chord. Words. Was it their colours? He allowed them to glow and fade, hue after hue: sunrise gold, the russet and green of apple orchards, azure of waves, the greyfringed fleece of clouds. No it was not their colours: it was the poise and balance of the period itself. Did he then love the rhythmic rise and fall of words better than their associations of legend and colour? Or was it that, being as weak of sight as he was shy of mind, he drew less pleasure from the reflection of the glowing sensible world through the prism of a language manycoloured and richly storied than from the contemplation of an inner world of individual emotions mirrored perfectly in a lucid supple periodic prose?”
    ― James Joyce, A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man
    The final lines, quoted verbatim of Molly Bloom’s soliloquy, from the movie version of “Ulysses” entitled “Bloom”:
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ii_aZ6djNkM
    Briefly: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wL_rXp-T4tc
    From the lips themselves:
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZhW0TrzWGmI

  252. “(Perhaps he was in denial…?)”
    Perhaps, but which one of you might one day suffer from Agenbite of Inwit at the beauty you missed?
    %-}
    “Yes, the newspapers were right: snow was general all over Ireland. It was falling softly upon the Bog of Allen and, further westwards, softly falling into the dark mutinous Shannon waves. It was falling too upon every part of the lonely churchyard where Michael Furey lay buried. It lay thickly drifted on the crooked crosses and headstones, on the spears of the little gate, on the barren thorns. His soul swooned slowly as he heard the snow falling faintly through the universe and faintly falling, like the descent of their last end, upon all the living and the dead.”
    The Dead
    James Joyce
    A passage from A Portrait of the Artist As A Young Man:
    “The phrase and the day and the scene harmonized in a chord. Words. Was it their colours? He allowed them to glow and fade, hue after hue: sunrise gold, the russet and green of apple orchards, azure of waves, the greyfringed fleece of clouds. No it was not their colours: it was the poise and balance of the period itself. Did he then love the rhythmic rise and fall of words better than their associations of legend and colour? Or was it that, being as weak of sight as he was shy of mind, he drew less pleasure from the reflection of the glowing sensible world through the prism of a language manycoloured and richly storied than from the contemplation of an inner world of individual emotions mirrored perfectly in a lucid supple periodic prose?”
    ― James Joyce, A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man
    The final lines, quoted verbatim of Molly Bloom’s soliloquy, from the movie version of “Ulysses” entitled “Bloom”:
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ii_aZ6djNkM
    Briefly: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wL_rXp-T4tc
    From the lips themselves:
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZhW0TrzWGmI

  261. @hsh — You can put incarceration rates next to gun deaths. I’m too busy/lazy to do it, but I’d like to see both those numbers over, say, the last century.
    @wj — “Joyce simple didn’t know how to handle the English language.” … I can’t even. 😉

  262. @hsh — You can put incarceration rates next to gun deaths. I’m too busy/lazy to do it, but I’d like to see both those numbers over, say, the last century.
    @wj — “Joyce simple didn’t know how to handle the English language.” … I can’t even. 😉

  267. “Joyce simple didn’t know how to handle the English language.”
    noone beat me to it with the last lines of The Dead, which was called by T S Eliot “one of the greatest short stories ever written”. I would also add that John Huston’s film of it, starring his daughter Anjelica, is very fine.

  268. “Joyce simple didn’t know how to handle the English language.”
    noone beat me to it with the last lines of The Dead, which was called by T S Eliot “one of the greatest short stories ever written”. I would also add that John Huston’s film of it, starring his daughter Anjelica, is very fine.

  269. Janie, never tried Faulkner. Perhaps blame my college professor (the one who assigned Joyce, but not Faulkner).
    Or are you suggesting that all the modern eriters of “Great Books” are equally poor,,,?

  270. Janie, never tried Faulkner. Perhaps blame my college professor (the one who assigned Joyce, but not Faulkner).
    Or are you suggesting that all the modern eriters of “Great Books” are equally poor,,,?

  271. Also, on something of a foodie tangent, someone I knew once was writing a book on offal, and looking for literary references, so I pointed them to Leopold Bloom’s breakfast kidney. Also Lampedusa’s wonderful description in The Leopard of the towering macaroni pie, of which:
    The burnished gold of the crusts, the fragrance of the sugar and cinnamon they exuded, were but preludes to the delights released from the interior when the knife broke the crust; first came a spice-laden haze, then chicken livers, hard boiled eggs, sliced ham, chicken and truffles in masses of piping hot, glistening macaroni to which the meat juice gave an exquisite hue of suede.
    Stanley Tucci made a version of this dish, first in the movie Big Night, and more recently with Jay Rayner, one of our best restaurant reviewers.
    https://www.theguardian.com/food/2021/oct/17/the-day-i-cooked-timpano-with-stanley-tucci-jay-rayner

  272. Also, on something of a foodie tangent, someone I knew once was writing a book on offal, and looking for literary references, so I pointed them to Leopold Bloom’s breakfast kidney. Also Lampedusa’s wonderful description in The Leopard of the towering macaroni pie, of which:
    The burnished gold of the crusts, the fragrance of the sugar and cinnamon they exuded, were but preludes to the delights released from the interior when the knife broke the crust; first came a spice-laden haze, then chicken livers, hard boiled eggs, sliced ham, chicken and truffles in masses of piping hot, glistening macaroni to which the meat juice gave an exquisite hue of suede.
    Stanley Tucci made a version of this dish, first in the movie Big Night, and more recently with Jay Rayner, one of our best restaurant reviewers.
    https://www.theguardian.com/food/2021/oct/17/the-day-i-cooked-timpano-with-stanley-tucci-jay-rayner

  273. Or are you suggesting that all the modern eriters of “Great Books” are equally poor,,,?
    Not generalizing. Also, though I know you’re joking, not suggesting that any of them are poor writers, never mind all of them.
    Faulkner and Joyce are glorious, but they require some work, and some acclimatization.
    I would throw in Dickens and George Eliot, who aren’t modern, but whose books I open up sometimes just to rest in the beauty of those gorgeous, complex, well-structured sentences.
    Embodying a complex thought train in well-structured prose: not entirely unlike writing an elegant bit of computer code………….

  274. Or are you suggesting that all the modern eriters of “Great Books” are equally poor,,,?
    Not generalizing. Also, though I know you’re joking, not suggesting that any of them are poor writers, never mind all of them.
    Faulkner and Joyce are glorious, but they require some work, and some acclimatization.
    I would throw in Dickens and George Eliot, who aren’t modern, but whose books I open up sometimes just to rest in the beauty of those gorgeous, complex, well-structured sentences.
    Embodying a complex thought train in well-structured prose: not entirely unlike writing an elegant bit of computer code………….

  275. wj – I think you are confusing the job of the literature professor with the job of the librarian. A lit professor’s job is to model how to be a better, more conscious reader. It’s the librarian’s job to be the literary matchmaker.
    For which, gods bless librarians.

  276. wj – I think you are confusing the job of the literature professor with the job of the librarian. A lit professor’s job is to model how to be a better, more conscious reader. It’s the librarian’s job to be the literary matchmaker.
    For which, gods bless librarians.

  277. Perhaps this will help elucidate my taste in books: I think it is manifest, from reading both, that Archie Goodwin is a vastly better writer than Rex Stout. (Sorry if this is unhelpful to those who have never encountered Nero Wolfe.) Really. Read both and you’ll see the difference.

  278. Perhaps this will help elucidate my taste in books: I think it is manifest, from reading both, that Archie Goodwin is a vastly better writer than Rex Stout. (Sorry if this is unhelpful to those who have never encountered Nero Wolfe.) Really. Read both and you’ll see the difference.

  279. @wj — well, that accounts for a lot of the flavor and trajectory of some ObWi discussions. 😉

  280. @wj — well, that accounts for a lot of the flavor and trajectory of some ObWi discussions. 😉

  283. That and the fact that I’m still the token (real) conservative here. Not a reactionary or a Trump cultist**, but still, I believe, a conservative. (Hey, it’s a rough job, but somebody’s got to do it!)
    ** And Charles has the libertarian angle covered.

  284. That and the fact that I’m still the token (real) conservative here. Not a reactionary or a Trump cultist**, but still, I believe, a conservative. (Hey, it’s a rough job, but somebody’s got to do it!)
    ** And Charles has the libertarian angle covered.

  285. And possibly at the root of modern (as opposed to ancient) opposition to abortion.
    All the most successful religions discourage contraception and forbid abortion. Because a successful religion breeds more adherents than an unsuccessful one.

  286. And possibly at the root of modern (as opposed to ancient) opposition to abortion.
    All the most successful religions discourage contraception and forbid abortion. Because a successful religion breeds more adherents than an unsuccessful one.

  287. But Christianity had a mania about virginity and abstinence, ideally for life, and was still successful.
    The Church was anti-abortion and anti-contraception because it was anti-sex. Even procreative sex was only tolerated (at least in theory).
    St.Augustine prayed for a method of procreation without having sex. Ironically, these days this is possible but the RCC is opposed to it. And the only method of contraception the RCC allows is the one St.Augustine was most opposed to (likely because it failed him and his girlfriend* at the time bore him a child).
    *I blame his mother St.Monica that they did not marry and lived happily ever after. I have an even stronger dislike towards her than towards her son.

  288. But Christianity had a mania about virginity and abstinence, ideally for life, and was still successful.
    The Church was anti-abortion and anti-contraception because it was anti-sex. Even procreative sex was only tolerated (at least in theory).
    St.Augustine prayed for a method of procreation without having sex. Ironically, these days this is possible but the RCC is opposed to it. And the only method of contraception the RCC allows is the one St.Augustine was most opposed to (likely because it failed him and his girlfriend* at the time bore him a child).
    *I blame his mother St.Monica that they did not marry and lived happily ever after. I have an even stronger dislike towards her than towards her son.

  289. https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2022/05/buffalo-shooting-anti-black-racist-ideology-anti-semitism/629891/
    William Faulkner’s literature is relevant:
    https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2020/11/30/william-faulkners-demons
    It will not stop until the entire American conservative movement, including the southern former Democrats it recruited and then mutually groomed to be racist and antisemitic and homophobic and anti-immigrant and misogynist, just fucking haters all the way around, are removed from the voting rolls and then from the face of the Earth.
    I believe fully in the great replacement theory and want it to succeed completely by next Friday.
    One million Somali goat herders can do Tucker Carlson’s job and for less pay.

  290. https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2022/05/buffalo-shooting-anti-black-racist-ideology-anti-semitism/629891/
    William Faulkner’s literature is relevant:
    https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2020/11/30/william-faulkners-demons
    It will not stop until the entire American conservative movement, including the southern former Democrats it recruited and then mutually groomed to be racist and antisemitic and homophobic and anti-immigrant and misogynist, just fucking haters all the way around, are removed from the voting rolls and then from the face of the Earth.
    I believe fully in the great replacement theory and want it to succeed completely by next Friday.
    One million Somali goat herders can do Tucker Carlson’s job and for less pay.

  291. “But Christianity had a mania about virginity and abstinence, ideally for life …”
    But, not yet!
    Thank you, Augie.

  292. “But Christianity had a mania about virginity and abstinence, ideally for life …”
    But, not yet!
    Thank you, Augie.

  293. the entire American conservative movement, including the southern former Democrats it recruited . . . are removed . . . from the face of the Earth.
    Well, so many seem to be anti-vaxxers that they may be taking care of that themselves. With an assist from covid, but also from various other “childhood” diseases — which, if you get them as an adult, are far more serious than they are for kids. Evolution in action.

  294. the entire American conservative movement, including the southern former Democrats it recruited . . . are removed . . . from the face of the Earth.
    Well, so many seem to be anti-vaxxers that they may be taking care of that themselves. With an assist from covid, but also from various other “childhood” diseases — which, if you get them as an adult, are far more serious than they are for kids. Evolution in action.

  295. The attitudes of various individuals and groups on abortion have changed a lot over the decades since Roe v Wade.
    “But that was before the great sorting. As late as 1976, it was possible for a Republican president’s wife to be a socially liberal feminist while his Democratic challenger earned the endorsement of Pat Robertson. By 1980, the religious right was not just clearly anti-abortion but clearly aligning itself with the national Republican Party; organized feminism, meanwhile, was increasingly drawn to the Democrats. Over the course of the ’80s, most politicians with national ambitions altered their stances accordingly. George H.W. Bush, who had started his political career as a population-control Republican, turned around and embraced the right-to-life movement. Al Gore, Dick Gephardt, and other Democrats who had once been on the right-to-life side joined Jesse Jackson in reinventing themselves as defenders of the right to choose.”
    When Ted Kennedy Was Pro-Life and Ronald Reagan Was Expanding Abortion Access: The forgotten abortion politics of the pre-Roe era

  296. The attitudes of various individuals and groups on abortion have changed a lot over the decades since Roe v Wade.
    “But that was before the great sorting. As late as 1976, it was possible for a Republican president’s wife to be a socially liberal feminist while his Democratic challenger earned the endorsement of Pat Robertson. By 1980, the religious right was not just clearly anti-abortion but clearly aligning itself with the national Republican Party; organized feminism, meanwhile, was increasingly drawn to the Democrats. Over the course of the ’80s, most politicians with national ambitions altered their stances accordingly. George H.W. Bush, who had started his political career as a population-control Republican, turned around and embraced the right-to-life movement. Al Gore, Dick Gephardt, and other Democrats who had once been on the right-to-life side joined Jesse Jackson in reinventing themselves as defenders of the right to choose.”
    When Ted Kennedy Was Pro-Life and Ronald Reagan Was Expanding Abortion Access: The forgotten abortion politics of the pre-Roe era

  299. I never fault someone for changing their opinion. Refusing to ever do so indicates imperviousness to learning. And probably imperviousness to reality.
    But you ought to be able to articulate what new facts caused your opinion to evolve. Perhaps new facts (not previously know, at least to you) did the trick. Perhaps you became acquainted with people with characteristics that you disliked, and that turned the trick. Even “My audience changed, so what I said changed” — that at least has the virtue of candor. If you admit it.
    But to just flip without explanation? All that does is suggest that you actually have no real opinion, and never did. And hope your audience have poor memories, so they won’t notice.

  300. I never fault someone for changing their opinion. Refusing to ever do so indicates imperviousness to learning. And probably imperviousness to reality.
    But you ought to be able to articulate what new facts caused your opinion to evolve. Perhaps new facts (not previously know, at least to you) did the trick. Perhaps you became acquainted with people with characteristics that you disliked, and that turned the trick. Even “My audience changed, so what I said changed” — that at least has the virtue of candor. If you admit it.
    But to just flip without explanation? All that does is suggest that you actually have no real opinion, and never did. And hope your audience have poor memories, so they won’t notice.

  301. Yeah, the fake is usually the warning. Truer words have never been said, outside of Ben Franklin’s, in soon to be dead dog shit America:
    https://twitter.com/KnowNothingTV/status/1526454217858236416
    Does the sawed-off little trumpian twat Rogan think his muscled arm guns there are bullet-proof, as we hunt down and butcher fucking conservative ignorance?
    Does the black dude with the dreads think I’m so racially politically correct that I won’t take him down for what he is doing on behalf of the conservative movement who will lynch him after he has picked their cotton?
    America is a dead piece of shit.

  302. Yeah, the fake is usually the warning. Truer words have never been said, outside of Ben Franklin’s, in soon to be dead dog shit America:
    https://twitter.com/KnowNothingTV/status/1526454217858236416
    Does the sawed-off little trumpian twat Rogan think his muscled arm guns there are bullet-proof, as we hunt down and butcher fucking conservative ignorance?
    Does the black dude with the dreads think I’m so racially politically correct that I won’t take him down for what he is doing on behalf of the conservative movement who will lynch him after he has picked their cotton?
    America is a dead piece of shit.

  309. Suddenly Pennsylvania Republicans Are OK With Counting Mail-In Ballots
    But
    a) Only in primary elections, and
    b) Only while primary results are in doubt.
    Once the results are final, everybody but the winner will snap back to denouncing them. As the 3rd place finisher, Barnette, is already doing.
    Stepping back to the big picture, has anyone seen speculation on how the general election results will be impacted by Republicans spending time and money contesting primary tesults, demanding (and perhaps getting) recounts, etc.? Not to mention supporters of the loser(s) potentially sitting out the general election in a pet.

  310. Suddenly Pennsylvania Republicans Are OK With Counting Mail-In Ballots
    But
    a) Only in primary elections, and
    b) Only while primary results are in doubt.
    Once the results are final, everybody but the winner will snap back to denouncing them. As the 3rd place finisher, Barnette, is already doing.
    Stepping back to the big picture, has anyone seen speculation on how the general election results will be impacted by Republicans spending time and money contesting primary tesults, demanding (and perhaps getting) recounts, etc.? Not to mention supporters of the loser(s) potentially sitting out the general election in a pet.

  311. For anyone who might care and hasn’t seen it, the BJ home page now has a signup for email updates on the situation. Which has now gone on for more than four days. Wow. (It blinked out late Saturday morning as far as I can tell.)

  312. For anyone who might care and hasn’t seen it, the BJ home page now has a signup for email updates on the situation. Which has now gone on for more than four days. Wow. (It blinked out late Saturday morning as far as I can tell.)

  319. Former President George W. Bush: “The decision of one man to launch a wholly unjustified and brutal invasion of Iraq. I mean of Ukraine.”

  320. Former President George W. Bush: “The decision of one man to launch a wholly unjustified and brutal invasion of Iraq. I mean of Ukraine.”

  321. Well Dubya *did* “look into Putin’s soul”…
    …and found a kindred spirit.

  322. Well Dubya *did* “look into Putin’s soul”…
    …and found a kindred spirit.

  323. … the approach [of the] media in reporting the court has undergone something of a change ?
    This brings back a memory, not about the media, and anyhow there was no 24-hour cable, never mind the internet, and I was just a kid and didn’t understand much about it, but….
    My family took a driving trip to Florida in 1963, when I was 13. There were big signs all over the South saying, “Impeach Earl Warren.”

  324. … the approach [of the] media in reporting the court has undergone something of a change ?
    This brings back a memory, not about the media, and anyhow there was no 24-hour cable, never mind the internet, and I was just a kid and didn’t understand much about it, but….
    My family took a driving trip to Florida in 1963, when I was 13. There were big signs all over the South saying, “Impeach Earl Warren.”

  325. That trip was at Easter time, so a few months before the March on Washington in 1963, which maybe, in retrospect, was a turning point in my understanding of the country I lived in.
    Big topic.

  326. That trip was at Easter time, so a few months before the March on Washington in 1963, which maybe, in retrospect, was a turning point in my understanding of the country I lived in.
    Big topic.

  327. … the approach [of the] media in reporting the court has undergone something of a change?
    Reporters covering the Supreme Court tend to be, or become, quite knowledgeable of the law and the Constitution. From the mid-1950s (the earliest time I personally remember), the Court’s decisions might be debatable or objectionable, but any educated person could see how they were rooted in those.**
    These days, opinions by the “conservative” justices are visibly rooted in politics rather than what the Constitution, or previous decisions, actually says. Hence the contortions about “original intent”. The reporters may not know as much about the Constitution as the Justices, but they know enough to recognize bullsh*t when they see it.
    ** Those “Impeach Earl Warren!” signs were more an objection to including blacks in the population covered by the Constitution’s mandates about “persons”. IIRC, there was much less argument about the substance of the decisions themselves.

  328. … the approach [of the] media in reporting the court has undergone something of a change?
    Reporters covering the Supreme Court tend to be, or become, quite knowledgeable of the law and the Constitution. From the mid-1950s (the earliest time I personally remember), the Court’s decisions might be debatable or objectionable, but any educated person could see how they were rooted in those.**
    These days, opinions by the “conservative” justices are visibly rooted in politics rather than what the Constitution, or previous decisions, actually says. Hence the contortions about “original intent”. The reporters may not know as much about the Constitution as the Justices, but they know enough to recognize bullsh*t when they see it.
    ** Those “Impeach Earl Warren!” signs were more an objection to including blacks in the population covered by the Constitution’s mandates about “persons”. IIRC, there was much less argument about the substance of the decisions themselves.

  329. … the approach [of the] media in reporting the court has undergone something of a change ?
    It’s amazing, and a bit depressing, how many typos I find using the Preview function. I still don’t catch everything. But by posts would be far worse without my using it. Sometimes multiple times. (And they are worse when I’m rushed, so I skip that step.)

  330. … the approach [of the] media in reporting the court has undergone something of a change ?
    It’s amazing, and a bit depressing, how many typos I find using the Preview function. I still don’t catch everything. But by posts would be far worse without my using it. Sometimes multiple times. (And they are worse when I’m rushed, so I skip that step.)

  331. See the one above, where I quoted “… the approach [of the] media in reporting the court has undergone something of a change ?” instead of “Oh for an edit function, post posting.”

  332. See the one above, where I quoted “… the approach [of the] media in reporting the court has undergone something of a change ?” instead of “Oh for an edit function, post posting.”

  333. Think Colorado is safe from subhuman facist republican vermin?
    “In Colorado, a GOP candidate for governor has a plan to eliminate the concept of one person, one vote from state-level elections (9NEWS-KUSA):
    Former Parker Mayor Greg Lopez, who holds the top line on the 2022 Republican primary ballot, says Colorado should create an electoral college system for electing candidates to statewide office.
    The plan, which would be the first of its kind on the state level, would give far more voting power to Coloradans in rural, conservative counties and dilute the voting power of Coloradans in more populous urban and suburban areas. Even as turnout numbers vary over time, the sheer number of rural conservative counties would create a built-in advantage for Republicans.
    9NEWS has audio.
    “One of the things that I’m going to do, and I’ve already put this plan together, is, as governor, I’m going to introduce a conversation about doing away with the popular vote for statewide elected officials and doing an electoral college vote for statewide elected officials,” Lopez said.
    Lopez said his electoral college plan would weight counties’ votes based on their voter turnout percentage to encourage turnout.
    “I’ve already got the plan in place,” Lopez said. “The most that any county can get is 11 electoral college votes. The least that a county can get is three.”
    Democrat Jared Polis won the last election for governor by double digits. Under Lopez’s plan, the race would have swung 30 points, handing the win to the Republican after winning a minority of votes.
    Unconstitutional? Sure. Does Lopez care? No.”
    via Hullabaloo.
    America will be a killing ground.
    “introduce a conversation”?
    Time to introduce a savage killing civil war.
    The Second Amendment is just another form of free expression.
    If I’m one man without one vote, then I’m a man with a million very noisy bullets.
    Fuck elections. Fuck the Courts. Kill Republican Party government everywhere.
    I repeat: they are going to kill all of us.
    America is fucking dead.

  334. Think Colorado is safe from subhuman facist republican vermin?
    “In Colorado, a GOP candidate for governor has a plan to eliminate the concept of one person, one vote from state-level elections (9NEWS-KUSA):
    Former Parker Mayor Greg Lopez, who holds the top line on the 2022 Republican primary ballot, says Colorado should create an electoral college system for electing candidates to statewide office.
    The plan, which would be the first of its kind on the state level, would give far more voting power to Coloradans in rural, conservative counties and dilute the voting power of Coloradans in more populous urban and suburban areas. Even as turnout numbers vary over time, the sheer number of rural conservative counties would create a built-in advantage for Republicans.
    9NEWS has audio.
    “One of the things that I’m going to do, and I’ve already put this plan together, is, as governor, I’m going to introduce a conversation about doing away with the popular vote for statewide elected officials and doing an electoral college vote for statewide elected officials,” Lopez said.
    Lopez said his electoral college plan would weight counties’ votes based on their voter turnout percentage to encourage turnout.
    “I’ve already got the plan in place,” Lopez said. “The most that any county can get is 11 electoral college votes. The least that a county can get is three.”
    Democrat Jared Polis won the last election for governor by double digits. Under Lopez’s plan, the race would have swung 30 points, handing the win to the Republican after winning a minority of votes.
    Unconstitutional? Sure. Does Lopez care? No.”
    via Hullabaloo.
    America will be a killing ground.
    “introduce a conversation”?
    Time to introduce a savage killing civil war.
    The Second Amendment is just another form of free expression.
    If I’m one man without one vote, then I’m a man with a million very noisy bullets.
    Fuck elections. Fuck the Courts. Kill Republican Party government everywhere.
    I repeat: they are going to kill all of us.
    America is fucking dead.

  335. By the way, Lopez has the foremost conservative movement qualification among his pussy subhuman conservative bonafides: An arrest for assaulting his pregnant wife.
    What the fuck are the guns for, I would ask her?

  336. By the way, Lopez has the foremost conservative movement qualification among his pussy subhuman conservative bonafides: An arrest for assaulting his pregnant wife.
    What the fuck are the guns for, I would ask her?

  337. What the fuck are the guns for, I would ask her?
    You really, really don’t want to raise that question! Because it might suggest using a gun to him. And, depending on how lunatic Colorado’s gun laws are, that might get him off altogether — i.e. not even arrested, because the police realize that assault with guns is OK. See Florida’s laws on the subject — assault and battery with fists may be illegal in Florida (I don’t know), but kill someone with a gun and you’re almost certain to get off.

  338. What the fuck are the guns for, I would ask her?
    You really, really don’t want to raise that question! Because it might suggest using a gun to him. And, depending on how lunatic Colorado’s gun laws are, that might get him off altogether — i.e. not even arrested, because the police realize that assault with guns is OK. See Florida’s laws on the subject — assault and battery with fists may be illegal in Florida (I don’t know), but kill someone with a gun and you’re almost certain to get off.

  339. the approach [of the] media in reporting the court has undergone something of a change?
    I can’t comment on the media, but I think I’ve mentioned before that many years ago, when I was briefly a law student (only one of many dodgy incidents in my past), decisions of the SCOTUS were treated with respect and often cited as at least persuasive precedent in the UK and other jurisdictions. But then, some years ago (during the Dubya regime I think, although it could have been Obama – certainly pre-Trump) when I was have having lunch with a very old friend who had become the Chief Justice of another jurisdiction, I mentioned this, and asked whether lawyers in other countries still had that kind of respect for the SCOTUS. The friend laughed ruefully, and said words to the effect of “only when their decisions have no conceivable political dimension”.

  340. the approach [of the] media in reporting the court has undergone something of a change?
    I can’t comment on the media, but I think I’ve mentioned before that many years ago, when I was briefly a law student (only one of many dodgy incidents in my past), decisions of the SCOTUS were treated with respect and often cited as at least persuasive precedent in the UK and other jurisdictions. But then, some years ago (during the Dubya regime I think, although it could have been Obama – certainly pre-Trump) when I was have having lunch with a very old friend who had become the Chief Justice of another jurisdiction, I mentioned this, and asked whether lawyers in other countries still had that kind of respect for the SCOTUS. The friend laughed ruefully, and said words to the effect of “only when their decisions have no conceivable political dimension”.

  341. Racist Christian anti-Commie Putin-licking, fascist Republicans have a decision to make:
    https://www.thedailybeast.com/siberian-lawmaker-viktor-kamenshchikov-who-criticized-putins-war-is-detained-on-us-mexico-border?via=newsletter&source=CSAMedition
    He’s white, and therefore by default, an honorary American citizen by birthright, but conservative subhumans may decide to send him back to Putin to be murdered and thereby help their cause of overthrowing the US government with Putin’s timely assistance.

  342. Racist Christian anti-Commie Putin-licking, fascist Republicans have a decision to make:
    https://www.thedailybeast.com/siberian-lawmaker-viktor-kamenshchikov-who-criticized-putins-war-is-detained-on-us-mexico-border?via=newsletter&source=CSAMedition
    He’s white, and therefore by default, an honorary American citizen by birthright, but conservative subhumans may decide to send him back to Putin to be murdered and thereby help their cause of overthrowing the US government with Putin’s timely assistance.

  347. Dr., do you believe in aborting a fetus/baby that is halfway delivered from the womb?
    (Well, only if it’s name is Newt Gingrich, as even his mother now believes should have been done.)
    https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2022/5/19/2098909/-Biden-and-House-take-action-to-ease-the-baby-formula-shortage-It-s-the-Senate-s-move-now
    Because we subhuman genocidal conservatives
    believe the entirely born human baby should be denied healthy baby formula and child tax credits upon the moment of birth and his or her mother denied the right to vote as well.
    If the baby wishes to breastfeed instead, then it can suck on Marjorie Taylor Greene’s dried up witch’s tits, the business end of Boebert’s semi-automatic pistol, or whatever it is Matt Gaetz proffers for sustenance to his under-aged dates.

  348. Dr., do you believe in aborting a fetus/baby that is halfway delivered from the womb?
    (Well, only if it’s name is Newt Gingrich, as even his mother now believes should have been done.)
    https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2022/5/19/2098909/-Biden-and-House-take-action-to-ease-the-baby-formula-shortage-It-s-the-Senate-s-move-now
    Because we subhuman genocidal conservatives
    believe the entirely born human baby should be denied healthy baby formula and child tax credits upon the moment of birth and his or her mother denied the right to vote as well.
    If the baby wishes to breastfeed instead, then it can suck on Marjorie Taylor Greene’s dried up witch’s tits, the business end of Boebert’s semi-automatic pistol, or whatever it is Matt Gaetz proffers for sustenance to his under-aged dates.

  349. Time to arm school children in red states, I mean besides the ones the Republican Party, the fascist Supreme Court, and the NRA already armed (and then consider as Republican candidates for political office) to murder kids and blacks and gays, and hispanics and teachers in their mass pogrom slaughters across America:
    https://digbysblog.net/2022/05/19/free-speech-for-dummies/

  350. Time to arm school children in red states, I mean besides the ones the Republican Party, the fascist Supreme Court, and the NRA already armed (and then consider as Republican candidates for political office) to murder kids and blacks and gays, and hispanics and teachers in their mass pogrom slaughters across America:
    https://digbysblog.net/2022/05/19/free-speech-for-dummies/

  351. I forgot the Jews on that list.
    Conservatives won’t. They always get around to murdering the Jews.
    The rest are just warm-up exercises for those killers.

  352. I forgot the Jews on that list.
    Conservatives won’t. They always get around to murdering the Jews.
    The rest are just warm-up exercises for those killers.

  353. I didn’t realize Murray and hernnstein’s Bell Curve for dumb white trash was mentioned in the Constitution as a requirement for conservatives running for President:
    https://digbysblog.net/2022/05/19/the-dumb-man-theory/
    But, the dumb fucks must be permitted to vote and kill America:
    https://digbysblog.net/2022/05/19/theyre-heading-to-jonestown/
    It’s not like elderly black women with semi-automatic weapons might take a break from grocery shopping to redistribute bullets to the vermin conservative deserving selling Trumpian dogshit on beaches, given the former’s higher IQs and more devoted parents.
    Apparently, the NRA and Amy armed America with only one-direction bullets.
    Time to fire in the other direction.

  354. I didn’t realize Murray and hernnstein’s Bell Curve for dumb white trash was mentioned in the Constitution as a requirement for conservatives running for President:
    https://digbysblog.net/2022/05/19/the-dumb-man-theory/
    But, the dumb fucks must be permitted to vote and kill America:
    https://digbysblog.net/2022/05/19/theyre-heading-to-jonestown/
    It’s not like elderly black women with semi-automatic weapons might take a break from grocery shopping to redistribute bullets to the vermin conservative deserving selling Trumpian dogshit on beaches, given the former’s higher IQs and more devoted parents.
    Apparently, the NRA and Amy armed America with only one-direction bullets.
    Time to fire in the other direction.

  357. Guess what I believe will happen to every murdering genocidal subhuman fascist conservative, one hundred million of the vermin monsters, in America, starting from the top:
    https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2022/05/roe-dobbs-abortion-ban-reproductive-medicine-alabama.html
    .. the same savage sentence of ferocious brutal death the citizens of Ukraine are dealing out to murdering genocidal subhuman conservative Russian soldiers who are taking orders from their fascist, and soon to be butchered and nuked conservative movement leader Vladimir Putin.

  358. Guess what I believe will happen to every murdering genocidal subhuman fascist conservative, one hundred million of the vermin monsters, in America, starting from the top:
    https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2022/05/roe-dobbs-abortion-ban-reproductive-medicine-alabama.html
    .. the same savage sentence of ferocious brutal death the citizens of Ukraine are dealing out to murdering genocidal subhuman conservative Russian soldiers who are taking orders from their fascist, and soon to be butchered and nuked conservative movement leader Vladimir Putin.

  359. In a separate vein, aimed at Janie’s open thread above regarding writers, Roger Angell, former fiction editor of the New Yorker and peerless elegiacal chronicler of the sport of baseball had died at the age of 101.
    Just as all the wrong people are shot dead in America, just so those who are taken from us by natural causes.

  360. In a separate vein, aimed at Janie’s open thread above regarding writers, Roger Angell, former fiction editor of the New Yorker and peerless elegiacal chronicler of the sport of baseball had died at the age of 101.
    Just as all the wrong people are shot dead in America, just so those who are taken from us by natural causes.

  365. Putin just banned 1000 Americans from entering Russia, including Biden and Harris.
    Notable names absent on the banned list: Genocidal murderers Hitler, Trump, and top pro-Soviet-expansionist vermin in the Republican Party, who are about to be held personally responsible for causing a shortage of Covid vaccines and treatments this Fall in order to foment the overthrow of the US Government.
    The Republican Party is killing America.
    Our government needs to goddamned kill the traitorous, insurrectionist, murderous Republican Party.
    That is why God gave us the fucking guns, which always seemed to me to be one of God’s biggest fuck-ups, maybe it was a gaffe, but now I see that GOD knew in the beginning what was coming and designed the instruments required to kill the present Evil.

  366. Putin just banned 1000 Americans from entering Russia, including Biden and Harris.
    Notable names absent on the banned list: Genocidal murderers Hitler, Trump, and top pro-Soviet-expansionist vermin in the Republican Party, who are about to be held personally responsible for causing a shortage of Covid vaccines and treatments this Fall in order to foment the overthrow of the US Government.
    The Republican Party is killing America.
    Our government needs to goddamned kill the traitorous, insurrectionist, murderous Republican Party.
    That is why God gave us the fucking guns, which always seemed to me to be one of God’s biggest fuck-ups, maybe it was a gaffe, but now I see that GOD knew in the beginning what was coming and designed the instruments required to kill the present Evil.

  369. David Frum:
    ‘All of which reminds me of something else I said often in the first weeks of the Trump presidency: “The sunny American confidence that everything will turn out all right it itself the greatest threat to everything turning out all right.” ‘

  370. David Frum:
    ‘All of which reminds me of something else I said often in the first weeks of the Trump presidency: “The sunny American confidence that everything will turn out all right it itself the greatest threat to everything turning out all right.” ‘

  371. Notable names absent on the banned list:
    You really should have mentioned Senators Mitch McConnell and Rand Paul. Kentucky should be so proud!

  372. Notable names absent on the banned list:
    You really should have mentioned Senators Mitch McConnell and Rand Paul. Kentucky should be so proud!

  383. https://digbysblog.net/2022/05/24/hordes-of-insects/
    One does wonder WHEN and WHAT it will take for armed conservatives and libertarians we all know and love, going all the way back to the Tacitus days, the Moe Lane original fake bipartisanship OBWI and extending into Hilzoy’s truly bipartisan stewardship, the fever swamps of Redstate, and the few decent individuals who stuck around here until recently, Marty, McKinneyTexas, Slart, Sebastian (maybe not armed) and Von, are going to step up and use their guns and ammo to kill and slaughter this clear and present, domestic, fascist, and mortal danger to the American Republic?
    When will the big swinging Second Amendment dicks finally do something to protect this country?
    Or was all that gun talk just hot air and a pissing contest aimed in some other direction away from the sacred tree of liberty.
    Or are all of you merely the satisfied godfathers and cackling midwives of this monstrous, sadistic horde of murderers because you just don’t want to pay taxes or be regulated in any way?
    States Rights is now just another name for the evil bedrock location for killing all of you RINOs first before these vermin come after the rest of us.
    They hate you the most. Being a RINO in conservative Trump Republican is now identical to being (only) half Jewish in 1935 Nazi Germany.
    Your open minded impurities doom you in the hateful eyes of a hundred million fascist Americans.
    You might get a cheerful middle finger from them as the trains you are on pass by and head East.
    You might kid yourselves that because I’m in a different boxcar and the train stops to take on fresh hay for only your boxcars that your ultimate fates will somehow differ from mine.
    Putin and Trump and their malignant murderous conservative movements are collaborating to destroy Europe and NATO, cause widespread starvation across the globe and out-of-control refugee migration emergencies (thus boosting the chances of fascist conservatism and murderous regimes winning out across the once-civilized world), steal every American election for their evil ends from this day forward and kill all liberalism and the Democratic Party’s legal access to governing, and all effective government, except for the bits that will be used to remove rights from and kill liberals and the Other.
    At least Charles offers his dislike of the irritating noise of gunfire as reason to sit on his thumbs and drone on with arid, logical Mr Spock illogic.
    This is not going to blow over. It’s not going to go away.
    It’s going to blow up.
    It’s coming right at us.

  384. https://digbysblog.net/2022/05/24/hordes-of-insects/
    One does wonder WHEN and WHAT it will take for armed conservatives and libertarians we all know and love, going all the way back to the Tacitus days, the Moe Lane original fake bipartisanship OBWI and extending into Hilzoy’s truly bipartisan stewardship, the fever swamps of Redstate, and the few decent individuals who stuck around here until recently, Marty, McKinneyTexas, Slart, Sebastian (maybe not armed) and Von, are going to step up and use their guns and ammo to kill and slaughter this clear and present, domestic, fascist, and mortal danger to the American Republic?
    When will the big swinging Second Amendment dicks finally do something to protect this country?
    Or was all that gun talk just hot air and a pissing contest aimed in some other direction away from the sacred tree of liberty.
    Or are all of you merely the satisfied godfathers and cackling midwives of this monstrous, sadistic horde of murderers because you just don’t want to pay taxes or be regulated in any way?
    States Rights is now just another name for the evil bedrock location for killing all of you RINOs first before these vermin come after the rest of us.
    They hate you the most. Being a RINO in conservative Trump Republican is now identical to being (only) half Jewish in 1935 Nazi Germany.
    Your open minded impurities doom you in the hateful eyes of a hundred million fascist Americans.
    You might get a cheerful middle finger from them as the trains you are on pass by and head East.
    You might kid yourselves that because I’m in a different boxcar and the train stops to take on fresh hay for only your boxcars that your ultimate fates will somehow differ from mine.
    Putin and Trump and their malignant murderous conservative movements are collaborating to destroy Europe and NATO, cause widespread starvation across the globe and out-of-control refugee migration emergencies (thus boosting the chances of fascist conservatism and murderous regimes winning out across the once-civilized world), steal every American election for their evil ends from this day forward and kill all liberalism and the Democratic Party’s legal access to governing, and all effective government, except for the bits that will be used to remove rights from and kill liberals and the Other.
    At least Charles offers his dislike of the irritating noise of gunfire as reason to sit on his thumbs and drone on with arid, logical Mr Spock illogic.
    This is not going to blow over. It’s not going to go away.
    It’s going to blow up.
    It’s coming right at us.

  387. I thought the perceived need to explicitly ban “explosives/bombs, missiles, cannons, flamethrowers” was particularly telling. After all, stuff doesn’t make the list unless you think someone might. Hence no ban (this time) on tanks, fighter aircraft or nukes.

  388. I thought the perceived need to explicitly ban “explosives/bombs, missiles, cannons, flamethrowers” was particularly telling. After all, stuff doesn’t make the list unless you think someone might. Hence no ban (this time) on tanks, fighter aircraft or nukes.

  389. Corporations are people who finance hatred and violence against the Other by the subhuman fascist Christian Republican Party:
    https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2022/5/23/2099777/-Corporate-PACs-publicly-support-racial-equality-and-justice-privately-fund-GOP-white-supremacists
    Corporations are the Other who finance hatred and violence against themselves by the subhuman fascist Christian Republican Party:
    https://www.salon.com/2022/05/23/texas-threatens-to-go-after-companies-that-help-employees-get-abortions-if-roe-is-overturned_partner/#:~:text=Texas%20GOP%20threatens%20to%20go%20after%20companies%20that,from%20doing%20business%20in%20Texas%20By%20Zach%20Despart
    Money is political speech. Money is people.
    Guns are people. Bullets are political speech.
    On what page of Hitler’s Mein Kampf does the U.S. Constitution withdraw its guaranteed protection of free speech?
    Page January 27, 1945 was too fucking late the last time around.

  390. Corporations are people who finance hatred and violence against the Other by the subhuman fascist Christian Republican Party:
    https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2022/5/23/2099777/-Corporate-PACs-publicly-support-racial-equality-and-justice-privately-fund-GOP-white-supremacists
    Corporations are the Other who finance hatred and violence against themselves by the subhuman fascist Christian Republican Party:
    https://www.salon.com/2022/05/23/texas-threatens-to-go-after-companies-that-help-employees-get-abortions-if-roe-is-overturned_partner/#:~:text=Texas%20GOP%20threatens%20to%20go%20after%20companies%20that,from%20doing%20business%20in%20Texas%20By%20Zach%20Despart
    Money is political speech. Money is people.
    Guns are people. Bullets are political speech.
    On what page of Hitler’s Mein Kampf does the U.S. Constitution withdraw its guaranteed protection of free speech?
    Page January 27, 1945 was too fucking late the last time around.

  391. The gun nuts may be nuts but they’re largely not the ones killing being killed with guns.

  392. The gun nuts may be nuts but they’re largely not the ones killing being killed with guns.

Comments are closed.