Wednesday Open Thread

25
  by: Colorado Pols January 25, 2023 at 8:05 AM MST

“The scene changes but the aspirations of men of good will persist.”

–Vannevar Bush

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25 Community Comments, Facebook Comments

  1. ParkHill says:
    January 25, 2023 at 9:03 AM MST

    Deep Dive into Ginny Thomas's Testimony to the Jan 6 Insurrection Committee, from TPM

    The committee had sought, in its late September interview with the spouse of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, to expose the errors of her doctrines and the crookedness of her path. But Thomas emerged from the roughly 4-hour meeting triumphant, her faith unshaken. No rack could break her. No fact could bend her.

    Thomas is an arch-conservative activist who has spent a lifetime advancing right-wing political causes in concert with other arch-conservative activists. But she does not, she says, much discuss her political activities with her spouse, the arch-conservative jurist who has used his lifetime seat on the U.S. Supreme Court to advance those same right-wing political causes.

    In her testimony, Thomas claimed household dominion over the “political lane,” with career stops at ideological outposts such as the Heritage Foundation, Hillsdale College and the Daily Caller, along with an active volunteer life in right-wing political networks, such as Frontliners and Groundswell. 

  2. ParkHill says:
    January 25, 2023 at 9:16 AM MST

    Freedom of the Press on Trial in Texas. Ian Milhiser at Vox.

    Ian Milhiser is always worth reading because he is an expert on the Supreme Court and is very good at explaining clearly legal issues.

    The plaintiffs in Children’s Health Defense v. Washington Post are an array of Covid conspiracy theorists, anti-vaxxers, and disgraced media figures who preach the gospel of ivermectin.

    They target four of the world’s leading media institutions — the Washington Post, the BBC, the Associated Press, and Reuters — claiming that these institutions violated federal antitrust law by conspiring with major tech companies to suppress many of the plaintiffs’ business. That is, the business of spreading highly dubious claims about a disease that killed more than a million Americans.

    In case there’s any doubt, these plaintiffs’ claims are meritless. It is not illegal for media companies to work together to promote public health — or to work together in myriad other ways — so long as the purpose of that collective effort is to advance social or political goals, as opposed to economic goals such as eliminating competitors.

    But the case will be heard by a judge who has spent his brief career on the bench acting like a rubber stamp for reactionary grievances: Trump appointee Matthew Kacsmaryk.

    Kacsmaryk is a longtime anti-sex crusader and former attorney for a Christian right law firm in Texas. Since then-President Donald Trump appointed him to the federal bench, however, Kacsmaryk has become one of the most powerful allies of reactionary causes in the United States. Indeed, he’s become one of the most consequential public officials in modern-day America largely due to a rule that automatically assigns every federal lawsuit filed in Amarillo, Texas, to him.

    • spaceman2021 says:
      January 25, 2023 at 9:19 AM MST

      This will not end well for the plaintiffs, though it may take awhile.  Looking forward to an eventual award of attorney's fees to the defendants.  Bankrupt these grifting abusers of the process.

    • Genghis says:
      January 25, 2023 at 1:58 PM MST

      Holy shit – RFK Jr., Joe Mercola, Jim Hoff, the Bollingers – lots of anti-vaxx grifter celebrities in that one!

    • Phoenix Rising says:
      January 25, 2023 at 2:03 PM MST

      And just how does that very unique docket distribution order stand up to any kind of scrutiny?

    • Conserv. Head Banger says:
      January 25, 2023 at 4:51 PM MST

      If one is a far rightie and is wanting to go to court, Kacsmaryk is the judge of choice. Among other cases he's gotten; or will get; is the radical righties suit to ban the sale of abortion pills. I've read that the Alliance Defending Freedom; a primary plaintiff; will ask for a national injunction. Mifepristone has been on sale since 2000 and is considered highly safe, meaning not a lot of side effects.

      So much for returning the abortion decision back to the states.

  3. Powerful Pear says:
    January 25, 2023 at 10:58 AM MST

    Every elected official takes an oath to protect and defend the Constitution of the United Sates, except for the Democrat controlled Colorado legislature. This rogue bunch of tyrant wannabes are pushing forward restrictive gun laws that violate the Constitution. But it doesn’t matter to them. Now the State will be saddled with the cost to defend this nonsense and the State will lose.

    A gun has never killed anyone……except for the one Alec Baldwin was holding. Apparently the gun dislike the producer and discharged itself. Tragic

    • spaceman2021 says:
      January 25, 2023 at 12:47 PM MST

      The data don't lie.  More guns=more death.  To deny that is to deny reality.  As for the notion that the proposed bill will violate the federal Constitution, that is a matter that will have to be litigated to determine if the regulation passes constitutional muster or not, PP.  Constitutional rights are not absolute, as clearly recognized in the Second Amendment context in DC v. Heller, by none other than Nino Scalia.  And its Democratic-controlled.  If you're going to spew your venom, at least try to get it grammatically correct, lest others feel inclined to point out your errors.  

      • Negev says:
        January 26, 2023 at 8:22 AM MST

        You may want to read further on that Heller thing:

        The District’s total ban on handgun possession in the home amounts to a prohibition on an entire class of “arms” that Americans overwhelmingly choose for the lawful purpose of self-defense. Under any of the standards of scrutiny the Court has applied to enumerated constitutional rights, this prohibition—in the place where the importance of the lawful defense of self, family, and property is most acute—would fail constitutional muster.

      • Genghis says:
        January 26, 2023 at 9:58 AM MST

        Constitutional rights are not absolute, as clearly recognized in the Second Amendment context in DC v. Heller, by none other than Nino Scalia.

        The late, great Justice John Paul Stevens wrote a book in which he strongly suggested that the majority opinion in Heller would have been an unhinged, bugfuck FedSoc 2d Am. manifesto but for Justice Kennedy saying something along the lines of "Tone that shit way down or I'll turn your majority opinion into a dissent."

    • unnamed says:
      January 25, 2023 at 2:40 PM MST

      Powerful Pear says:

      January 24, 2023 at 3:41 PM MST

      you must realize by now that all politicians will lie to you as long as they think they can get away with it.

      Powerful Pear says:

      January 25, 2023 at 11:12 AM MST

      What lie did I tell?

      Here's another lie Roger told

      Powerful Pear says:

      January 25, 2023 at 10:58 AM MST

      A gun has never killed anyone……except for the one Alec Baldwin was holding. Apparently the gun dislike the producer and discharged itself. Tragic

    • kwtree says:
      January 25, 2023 at 7:47 PM MST

      We're 25 days in to 2023, and have already suffered 40+ mass shootings, mostly committed with guns designed to kill large numbers of people quickly.

      Which part of the Constitution was it that guaranteed the right of murderers to kill people en masse?

      • Conserv. Head Banger says:
        January 25, 2023 at 8:48 PM MST

        You're posting your second paragraph on the wrong site. Send it to Gun Owners of America. They're the ones who think that the NRA is a bunch of wimps and wussies.

  4. DavidThi808 says:
    January 25, 2023 at 11:33 AM MST

    Public Service Announcement:

    Reminder – don't feed the trolls!

  5. Genghis says:
    January 25, 2023 at 1:53 PM MST

    The Colorado Court of Appeals will issue its opinion tomorrow morning in Scardina v. Masterpiece Cakeshops, Inc. Yep, Masterpiece is the same shitbird outfit that brought us that laughably awful SCOTUS decision in 2018.

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