Tag: 2011 US Politics

…The Public Debt Of The United States… Shall Not Be Questioned…

If I had a chance I would wallow in US constitutional law for no other goal than to enjoy how the flow if words can be used and misused and wondered upon. Consider the fourth section of the 14th Amendment brought in after the US Civil War. It has an interesting application – of some sort – today:

…It is inconsistent with the political context that produced Section 4, because it would not give the Republicans the sort of assurances they needed. We should interpret section 4 so that it solved the political problems that the Republicans wanted to solve. If our proposed interpretation does not solve those problems, it is very likely that we have picked the wrong reading. I begin with the assumption that the central purpose of section 4 was to prevent the Democrats, once they regained political power, from repudiating the Union debt– including pensions and bounties. To use my colleague Jed Rubenfeld’s language, this was the “paradigm case” of what Section 4 prohibited. But what if the Democrats did not officially repudiate the Union debt but but merely chose (or threatened) not to repay it?

Flip the Democrats and Republicans and more it 145 years into the future and we are looking at today’s news: “The Obama administration and congressional leaders are working to complete a deal on a long-term budget reduction package…” So, if the talks fail and a default on the debt occurs, is that the “questioning” that the section refers to? “Questioning?” What a horrible word to place in a constitution. Questioning occurs before there are facts known. I question my kid when I find his room overly messy. I question claims made my individually wrapped snacks as to their healthiness. What the heck does “shall not be questioned” when placed in a constitution?

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Friday Bullets For Canada Day And The Fourth

I have been waiting for this arrangement of holidays for years. We are off today so I got up at the crack of 10:15 am. The authorities have noticed. I should mow the lawn, too, but it is stinking hot. I haven’t even been out yet and I know that. Then we roam. Looking forward to the Rochester branch of Dino BBQ as well as the Museum of Play.

  • • On the one hand, there should not be a political penalty for being a practicing Christian. On the other, lying is a sin.
  • • Ben found it! My post with the goofy pictures of Harper that the Grits tried to use against him in the last election. Gold!!!
  • • I know nothing about YouTube channels but was really interested to find that the UK’s Open University has adopted the tool.
  • • No one – and I mean noooooooo one – told me that in 2008 an asteroid slammed into Sudan lighting up the night sky.
  • • I heard an amazing stat this week – that 10% of all CD sales in 2011 so far were Adele’s. Which means, yes, there are taxes to be paid.
  • • I need to make my own skittles. The neighbour gave me a whack of apple tree logs last year which I was going to use for smoking meat but now I am making massive skittles out of them instead. I will only need a cheese to fling at them.

Off I go. Maybe to mow. I have a red t-short on that says “Maryland.” I hope that counts.

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Friday Bullets For The First Third Of June

Why not measure the month in thirds? The dates lead us to that but the weeks knock us off that path. My first third of June was noted by a hair cut and a massive storm that saw me shouting at roofers on Wednesday night. Shouting “GET THE HELL OFF THE ROOF!!!” and other such things. Came up fast. They had to scramble. What else was a first third event? Sox are back on top. El Tigre is a conventioneer. It didn’t snow. Dandelions appear to have departed.

  • • A great use of the web to tell the story of Canada’s role on D-Day.
  • • Best Canadian political ad I have seen in a long time… and, no, not any kind of rip off. Far better than the bland Tory fare.
  • • Nice to see the separatists still having problems. I have no issue with including separatism in the political debate. I just like it losing the political debate.
  • • Speaking of losing causes.
  • • Sounds like Steven Moffat wants to make another show, other than Doctor Who, while making Doctor Who. James Bow is more hopeful of the direction of the season than I am.
  • • I had no idea that “a ne’er-do-well” was either a legal term or used in modern journalism.

There. I am off to the states this morning for work. Tour of a base. Maybe there’ll be pictures. Back by supper. Wizards have started play. May cross again on Sunday.

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How Originalists Get Wobbly On Law

Hearing Justice Alito, at least a form of originalist, had dissented in the very difficult case of the foul mouthed wacko protesters at a military funeral had me running to read his words to see how he got it wrong. Because when folk who claim to a certain level of purity go out on a limb, well, that is when you find out what is really going on. And there is it in the second paragraph of his opinion [warning: .pdf]:

Mr Snyder wanted what is surely the right of any parent who experiences such incalculable loss: to bury his son in peace. But respondents, members of Westboro Baptist Church, deprived him of that elementary right.

See, no matter how awful and stupid the protests were, not matter how hurtful their effect… they did not trigger a “right” of the parent. A right is a relationship set out in law. Do we have a right to be left alone in grief and respected? No, because we should have respect at that moment as a matter of cultural norm. Decency. The members of Westboro Baptist Church were unbelievably indecent and, frankly, clearly have a higher authority to answer to in the Christian construct for their act of judgment. But there is no right. Free speech, however, is a right in the US constitution for which there are legal protections. To balance that, Alito needs to make something up which he does at page 11 when he states that funerals are unique events at which special protection against emotional assault is in order. Where does that come from? His sense of decency. Which is great and admirable and what we all wish for. But it is not of the constitutional order of things.

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Friday Bullets For Truck Week

It was “Truck Day” this week and so by extension this is Truck Week. Is February Truck Month? It’s not a bad idea. The beginning of the end of winter. You can see it in how the sun melts the road cover even if you can’t feel it in a skip in your step. A few short weeks are left. Lawns shall be mown. Pork shall be smoked. Did you realized it’s two weeks tomorrow that the first game of spring training is played? Life has meaning again.

  • We Do What We Want Update: if it weren’t so sad it would be a great Kids in the Hall script – ““It’s like we’re on CSI or an investigative forensic thing – who’s put the ‘not’ in. I’d like to know what your issue is,” she said then. “What is your issue?” Resign.
  • Deferring a political and cultural question to the Canadian Standards Association, safe keeper of hockey helmets and other consumer products is both startling innovative and wildly dumb.
  • See. Tail. Wag. Dog… See. Crisis. In. Right. Begin.
  • Make your own joke here: “Bay Street lawyers fear job losses.”
  • I really dislike suits but mainly because they look like really dull pajamas made of far too heavy a cloth.
  • Really? “This government has a hostility toward people who think for a living or people who write for a living…”?

Did you know a Bieber movie opens today? Spot man with pre-teen.

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What Is Canadian Exceptionalism? [“Rimshot”!]

I watched a biography of Ronald Reagan on PBS last night and was reminded of a lot of things. He was my high school to my getting into law school. He did come across as an old stuffy bumpkin know it all as well as your favorite uncle. All anyone had to do back then was to say “wehhlll” and toggle his head to get a laugh. But he told a good story. And he used the phrase “self-government” in a way Canadians don’t understand. For us it is just about autonomy – whether a euphemism for Quebec separation or greater First Nations autonomy. But in the states, it means running your own affairs. It may also mean less government, more local government or a bunch of other things. I don’t really know. See, I am Canadian.

Over on Facebook, a beer blogging acquaintance supposed that there must be something called “Canadian exceptionalism” which immediately struck me as an oxymoron – like curling action. All I could think of was “Canada would be a greater nation except…” Don’t get me wrong, I think this is a great country except we don’t talk about it. The very idea is a dirty phrase politically. We have other things to do. Ronnie Raygun would have talked about it. He had no issue with the idea of unity, purpose and a greater collective good. In that sense he is mirrored by Obama. He just didn’t see it as a function of government action. He did see it, however, as a proper government policy but one placing the function over into the private sector, aligning it with the responsibility of each citizen. Responsibility. He was no Randian.

Is there something or someone to blame for the drift from a paradigm that Reagan would even recognize let alone support? Did he create a backlash such that conservatism had to become what it is today, the neighbour of disloyalty, the ideological puritan happy to bring the house down, the disassembler? In taking apart the story of the other side did it also throw out the idea of having any story at all? Or have we just drifted of our own accord without anyone to give a better road map, tell a better story.

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