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Pol Lounge General News Thread of "This doesn't deserve it's own thread" (Page 60)
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Thorzdad
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Sep 2, 2021, 09:35 AM
 
I guess it's small comfort that Roberts finally showed a wee modicum of spine and voted for intervening.
     
subego
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Sep 2, 2021, 10:31 AM
 
Originally Posted by Thorzdad View Post
SCOTUS was petitioned to intervene and declined to do so.
They just declined an emergency stay. They’ll take the case through the normal channels.
     
Thorzdad
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Sep 2, 2021, 11:46 AM
 
Originally Posted by subego View Post
They just declined an emergency stay. They’ll take the case through the normal channels.
Perhaps. On the other hand, to not grant a temporary stay on such an egregious, harmful, bluntly cruel law, one wonders what the outcome might be if a proper challenge ever makes it to them. This is especially worrisome given that the law was purposely written in a manner as to make it almost impossible to actually be challenged in court. There's no one to sue.
     
subego
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Sep 2, 2021, 12:13 PM
 
It’s certainly already being challenged. This Supreme Court decision applied to a pending lawsuit.

I tried to look at the law yesterday
but it was one
Spaceof those deals
like this and I
Spacecouldn’t be
arsed.
     
Thorzdad
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Sep 2, 2021, 01:32 PM
 
Originally Posted by subego View Post
It’s certainly already being challenged. This Supreme Court decision applied to a pending lawsuit.
Perhaps.

But, SCOTUS has intervened on issues far less critical. Their decision not to act affects not just the abortion issue, but also the issue of judicial precedent and the standing of the court itself. The law, as written, is intended to bypass judicial review and render Roe (and Casey), in all practicality, null-and-void. The law is a big eff-you to the court.

This Slate piece is a good read on the issues at hand and the implications of the court's inaction.
     
subego
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Sep 2, 2021, 01:32 PM
 
Originally Posted by Thorzdad View Post
Perhaps. On the other hand, to not grant a temporary stay on such an egregious, harmful, bluntly cruel law, one wonders what the outcome might be if a proper challenge ever makes it to them.
FWIW, if I’m understanding Alito’s reasoning correctly (and I very well may not), the reasoning is the law isn’t really enforceable, and it’s the enforcement of a law that causes the danger which warrants a stay, not how shitty the law is.

Also FWIW, Alito insists this is a decision based on procedural precedent, not anything to do with the constitutionality of the law itself. Roberts seems to confirm that, even though he dissents with regards to the procedure.
     
subego
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Sep 2, 2021, 02:08 PM
 
Originally Posted by Thorzdad View Post
Perhaps.

But, SCOTUS has intervened on issues far less critical.
If I’m understanding Alito correctly (and again, I may not be), there’s a test (which I am unfamiliar with) for whether a stay should be granted. This case did not pass the test in his view.

A vitally important thing to note is Alito claims this test is not just based on the law itself, but arguments made by the litigants. That’s the foundation of his opinion. The relevant litigants didn’t make a good argument for an emergency stay, so they’re not going to get one regardless of whether good arguments exist.

This is one of Alito’s defining traits. He seems to only consider arguments made in court. If one of the litigants does a bad job making their case, tough shit. He’s not going to fix it for them.
     
subego
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Sep 10, 2021, 01:49 PM
 
Okay, I understand this case better now.

If you’ve ever heard someone say “you can’t sue the government”, that’s what this is about.

The applicants tried the novel strategy of suing every district judge in Texas. Since that’s never been tried before, the courts have never determined whether that’s legal. It’s probably not, because a judge acting in their capacity as judge (probably) has what’s known as sovereign immunity, which means they can’t be sued without consent.

The way Alito sees it, it was up to the applicants to make a case for why these judges don’t have sovereign immunity in this scenario. They didn’t, so the application was dismissed.
     
OreoCookie
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Sep 12, 2021, 09:38 PM
 
@subego
I am not sure whether this goes to the heart of the matter. Most of the criticism I have seen is to decide the case via the shadow docket rather than give it a full hearing, which it deserves. The actual legal issue is whether the legislature can deputize the public this way and indirectly enforce something plainly unconstitutional, but trying to completely avoid state involvement (causing standing problems in the process). Replace abortion with e. g. unconstitutional restrictions on the Second Amendment or restrictions on religious freedoms. I don’t think the case would have been decided on the shadow docket.
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subego
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Sep 13, 2021, 12:01 AM
 
My post outlined the rationale given by Alito why it was shadow docketed. It’s the direct response to your criticism.

This lawsuit (again, probably) isn’t legal. The applicants are (probably) not allowed to sue because the defendants (probably) have sovereign immunity.

This is a legitimate conflict, no? To grant the injunction would (probably) upend 100+ year old sovereign immunity precedent.
     
OreoCookie
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Sep 13, 2021, 03:58 AM
 
Originally Posted by subego View Post
My post outlined the rationale given by Alito why it was shadow docketed. It’s the direct response to your criticism.
I understand this, but I don't find it a particularly convincing argument for handling this case via the shadow docket. You wrote in your second post that Alito only seems to be going on the arguments presented to him. I find that unconvincing since the plaintiffs weren't give the opportunity to present their case in full in front of the court.

One way or another, I think laws like this that are designed to avoid being challenged in court by denying standing to the state requires more careful consideration. It is perfect precedence material independently of the constitutionality of the abortion restrictions.

If this law is taken up again by the Supreme Court, I don't think they will want to touch this hot potato (would be consistent with the recent trend of narrow rulings), because you can always say that it is inconsistent with Roe vs. Wade and Casey. But IMHO just the sidestepping of standing is worthy of legal analysis by itself. I don't think you should be able to write laws whose structure is beyond the Supreme Court's reach. I very much doubt that the conservative judges Supreme Court would have let that stand if the law infringed on one of rights that conservatives focus more on.

I'm saying that as someone know who doesn't have a fixed opinion on how to resolve this tension. Yes, judges should not be sued for doing their jobs. But you also should not be able to create laws that are designed to put themselves beyond the reach of legal scrutiny.
Originally Posted by subego View Post
This lawsuit (again, probably) isn’t legal. The applicants are (probably) not allowed to sue because the defendants (probably) have sovereign immunity.
I don't think this is the correct interpretation: bringing forth lawsuits is perfectly legal, and sometimes the question of standing is just one of the important questions to be resolved. AFAIK there are only a few types of suits that are plainly illegal, e. g. frivolous lawsuits and under certain circumstances SLAP suits.
Originally Posted by subego View Post
This is a legitimate conflict, no? To grant the injunction would (probably) upend 100+ year old sovereign immunity precedent.
I don't think it is as easy as that: to my knowledge there has never been a law like the Texas law either, which is designed to sidestep this. So in my understanding, this has all the hallmarks of a precedent.
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Waragainstsleep
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Sep 13, 2021, 04:12 AM
 
About the snitching aspect of the Texas abortion law:

My understanding is the state is offering to fund people bringing civil suits to the tune of $10k each. Are there laws about false or frivolous suits in Texas? I'm thinking at worst a load of suits brought against people who didn't aid an abortion (perhaps against Republican state legislators for example) could clog up the system and at best could bankrupt the state if they have to keep paying out for them. Might force a rethink if enough citizens do it.
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OreoCookie
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Sep 13, 2021, 05:34 AM
 
Originally Posted by Waragainstsleep View Post
About the snitching aspect of the Texas abortion law:

My understanding is the state is offering to fund people bringing civil suits to the tune of $10k each. Are there laws about false or frivolous suits in Texas?
How effective will that be in practice? I think you can think of many reasonable defenses that will let the other person off the hook in practice. If, say, I accompany my wife to a Planned Parenthood for, say, cancer screening, then I don't think it is too unreasonable to speculate whether she got an abortion. Or if my wife had a miscarriage and someone suspects an abortion, would that be reasonable? I think the standards will be quite low.

While this is a huge problem, I think the others are worse. For example, why would anyone get $10k if they aren't injured in any way? Do I get money from the driver who killed my neighbor in a drunk driving incident?
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Thorzdad
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Sep 13, 2021, 08:39 AM
 
Originally Posted by OreoCookie View Post
For example, why would anyone get $10k if they aren't injured in any way? Do I get money from the driver who killed my neighbor in a drunk driving incident?
The $10k is a bounty. The republicans don't call it that, of course, but that's pretty much the way it works.
     
subego
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Sep 13, 2021, 12:22 PM
 
Originally Posted by OreoCookie View Post
AFAIK there are only a few types of suits that are plainly illegal, e. g. frivolous lawsuits…
A frivolous lawsuit is a lawsuit which cannot be won. A lawsuit against a person with immunity to lawsuits cannot be won.
     
subego
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Sep 13, 2021, 12:27 PM
 
Originally Posted by Waragainstsleep View Post
at best could bankrupt the state if they have to keep paying out for them
The State doesn’t pay out the $10K, the defendant does.
     
subego
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Sep 13, 2021, 02:26 PM
 
Originally Posted by OreoCookie View Post
I very much doubt that the conservative judges Supreme Court would have let that stand if the law infringed on one of rights that conservatives focus more on.
Whether I agree with a judicial interpretation is independent of whether the justice supplying it will apply it inconsistently.
     
subego
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Sep 13, 2021, 09:47 PM
 
Originally Posted by OreoCookie View Post
I find that unconvincing since the plaintiffs weren't give the opportunity to present their case in full in front of the court.
Which case? The case that the Texas law is unconstitutional, or the case that the judges they’re suing don’t have sovereign immunity? They can’t plead the former without convincing the Court of the latter.

They were denied a hearing on the former because they didn’t convince the Court of the latter.

They were denied a hearing on the latter because they made no case for it whatsoever it in their application.

Edit: and also because if they were given the opportunity to present the case for the latter in full, they’d still probably lose.
( Last edited by subego; Sep 14, 2021 at 02:21 AM. )
     
OreoCookie
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Sep 14, 2021, 02:41 AM
 
Originally Posted by subego View Post
They were denied a hearing on the former because they didn’t convince the Court of the latter.

They were denied a hearing on the latter because they made no case for it whatsoever it in their application.

Edit: and also because if they were given the opportunity to present the case for the latter in full, they’d still probably lose.
I understand that this was ultimately the decision, but given that it was 5:4 with the Chief Justice dissenting, I would say the issue is not as clear cut as you present it here. I don’t think it is a fair characterization to write “obviously, sovereign immunity of judges kills the case” when the (conservative) Chief Justice doesn’t think so.

Even if as you say “they’d likely still lose at the end”, I think there would have been value in hearing reasoned arguments and getting a fully worked out Supreme Court verdict. Like I wrote, I think it is fair to say that the way the Texas law is constructed is novel, and it would have been a good idea to set a precedent. Even if that precedent is “sovereign immunity takes precedence”.
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subego
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Sep 14, 2021, 03:26 PM
 
Probably, not obviously… I was really careful about that.

Along those lines, were the applicants to get a hearing on the sovereign immunity question it would probably be 6-3. Roberts’ dissent is not simply “opposite of the majority”. In fact, he implies in his dissent he probably agrees with the rest of the conservatives. The only difference is he’d grant the applicants a hearing.

In regards to that hearing, Alito isn’t denying it just because the applicants would probably lose, but also this in combination with the applicants’ failure to ask the Court to consider the question. Like I said earlier, if an issue isn’t brought up by the litigants, he’s not going to consider it. I believe the proper term for this philosophy of jurisprudence is judicial minimalism. I can point to his dissent on (I believe) Whole Women’s Health v. Texas Hellerstedt for another example of this behavior, where he says flat-out “I’m not considering whether Planned Parenthood v. Casey is invalid because I wasn’t asked to” (that’s a paraphrase).
( Last edited by subego; Sep 16, 2021 at 03:56 PM. )
     
OreoCookie
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Sep 14, 2021, 08:06 PM
 
Originally Posted by subego View Post
Along those lines, were the applicants to get a hearing on the sovereign immunity question it would probably be 6-3. Roberts’ dissent is not simply “opposite of the majority”. In fact, he implies in his dissent he probably agrees with the rest of the conservatives. The only difference is he’d grant the applicants a hearing.
Yes, and I should have said that: it was just about granting a full hearing. But be that as it may, I would still say that you can‘t say the case was “obviously illegal” when four SC justices were at least willing to hear the case. Don’t forget that also a principled decision against the motion will carry more weight if it had been given a full hearing, and a detailed reasoning worked out by the judges.
Originally Posted by subego View Post
In regards to that hearing, Alito isn’t denying it just because the applicants would probably lose, but also this in combination with the applicants’ failure to ask the Court to consider the question. Like I said earlier, if an issue isn’t brought up by the litigants, he’s not going to consider it. I believe the proper term for this philosophy of jurisprudence is judicial minimalism. I can point to his dissent on (I believe) Whole Women’s Health v. Texas for another example of this behavior, where he says flat-out “I’m not considering whether Planned Parenthood v. Casey is invalid because I wasn’t asked to” (that’s a paraphrase).
I think people get big on philosophical principles, when it is easy and goes along their dispositions. And it is easy to find a posteriori justifications in terms of judicial principles. But usually there are competing principles where one has to weigh one against the other. Gorsuch put textualism above his other core principles like deference to the status quo (“no judicial activism”) in the Bostock decision.
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subego
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Sep 14, 2021, 08:21 PM
 
Originally Posted by OreoCookie View Post
I would still say that you can‘t say the case was “obviously illegal”
Before I give a complete answer to your post, I need to understand where “obviously illegal” coming from. The direct quote from Alito as to whether judges have sovereign immunity is “[n]or is it clear”. He’s explicitly saying this is an unanswered question.
     
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Sep 14, 2021, 09:09 PM
 
Originally Posted by subego View Post
Before I give a complete answer to your post, I need to understand where “obviously illegal” coming from. The direct quote from Alito as to whether judges have sovereign immunity is “[n]or is it clear”. He’s explicitly saying this is an unanswered question.
We don’t need to do a deep dive on this, I don’t think it is worth it to get lost in a rabbit hole. I have the impression that we’d chase each other’s tails on slightly imprecise wording of one or the other (probably both) and whether my interpretation truly reflected what you intended to say. (In this instance, probably I took a bit too much liberty in my wording, I blame the lack of sufficient quantities of coffee this morning, we ran out. )
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subego
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Sep 14, 2021, 09:23 PM
 
Just wanted to be sure there wasn’t a critical point I was missing!
     
subego
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Sep 15, 2021, 04:58 PM
 
Originally Posted by OreoCookie View Post
I think people get big on philosophical principles, when it is easy and goes along their dispositions. And it is easy to find a posteriori justifications in terms of judicial principles. But usually there are competing principles where one has to weigh one against the other. Gorsuch put textualism above his other core principles like deference to the status quo (“no judicial activism”) in the Bostock decision.
Respectfully (and I really do mean that) this is an ad hominem, and carries no weight.

The character of the person making the argument is irrelevant to the qualities of the argument they make.
     
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Sep 15, 2021, 07:47 PM
 
Originally Posted by subego View Post
Respectfully (and I really do mean that) this is an ad hominem, and carries no weight.

The character of the person making the argument is irrelevant to the qualities of the argument they make.
I’m not sure I understand: I wasn’t speaking of the judges, but people and commentators interpreting their verdicts. And since I was not speaking of any one person in particular, I don’t quite understand why you think that counts as an ad hominem argument. Everyone, including Supreme Court justices use more than one philosophical principle at a time to help guide their reasoning. Gorsuch could have come to a different conclusion in the Bostock case if he had prioritized some of his other principles over textualism. My point was that you could use the same judicial philosophy to arrive at either side of the conclusion.

(I’m not attacking Gorsuch, I was just using this example, because a very conservative judge used one strand of conservative judicial principles to arrive at a conclusion that many conservative commentators did not like. It is an example where different principles were in tension, nothing more.)
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subego
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Sep 15, 2021, 07:54 PM
 
Well, it was posted in response to my explanation of Alito’s rationale, which I gather you disagree with, and assumed it was a challenge to his rationale.

Similar to the one given earlier that Alito would rule differently were the case about a conservative pet cause.
     
subego
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Sep 15, 2021, 11:21 PM
 
Let me ask a general question.

If a party sues someone who is likely immune, does the plaintiff bear any responsibility or burden to address in their filing the likely immunity of the defendant?
( Last edited by subego; Sep 16, 2021 at 12:25 AM. )
     
OreoCookie
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Sep 16, 2021, 12:45 AM
 
Originally Posted by subego View Post
Let me ask a general question.

If a party sues someone who is likely immune, does the plaintiff bear any responsibility or burden to address the likely immunity of the defendant?
Not necessarily.
Put yourself in the position of the person writing the brief: you have a limited amount of space, you have the realities of the court and your brief needs to be as easily understandable as possible.

If I were to write it, I'd think who it is that I would like to convince. And in an abortion case, Alito wouldn't be my first choice. Or second. Or third. Or fourth. Neither would I consider aiming at convincing Justice Thomas. I'd try to convince Roberts and then someone else. To be honest, I don't know who that second person is, I'd have to think about that more. Since the members of the conservative bench is picked from a jurisprudential monoculture (all have ties to the Federalist Society and the stance on abortion is a key criterion when selecting judges for the list of qualified candidates), perhaps it is also a tall order given the current composition of the Supreme Court.

Then I would choose the issue that I think would matter most to the Justices I'd want to convince. Now I can say that to me the problem of a law whose “effect is plainly unconstitutional, but designed to be immune to judicial review” is a huge problem, and I'd find that to be the most salient issue. But would it be the best issue to convince the Justices I'd aim to convince? I don't know.

So why not add these arguments, it can't hurt to include them — or can it? In my experience writing, I find that if you want to explain and/or convince something to others, especially initially, you are much better off simplifying and not cover all the facets. Writing good text when you have strands going every which way is extremely hard. Therefore, I'd focus on my best arguments that maximize the chances of convincing the people I'd like to convince. Perhaps you think your best argument (for the intended audience) is that the law is in plain conflict with precedence and the constitutional right of women to get an abortion. Again, from a pragmatic perspective I wouldn't even try to convince Alito, so I wouldn't particularly care what he has to say.

Just to be sure, I don't claim that it was right that the issue of standing wasn't included. Like I said, I think this was the really intellectually interesting and worrying bit about the law to me. Would I have included it or made it the centerpiece of my arguments in the brief? I don't think I have the expertise to say. But by the same token, it may also be true that you'd get a 5:4 split no matter what arguments I would have included because of the ideological predispositions.

Make sense?
Originally Posted by subego View Post
Well, it was posted in response to my explanation of Alito’s rationale, which I gather you disagree with, and assumed it was a challenge to his rationale.
Like I wrote, I think this is an explanation that is too simple to be of any use to me. That is because the Supreme Court mostly has to adjudicate cases where different rights and/or judicial principles are in conflict and you can reach a different answer by reordering them.

What you wrote is consistent, but IMHO not particularly useful for me.
Originally Posted by subego View Post
Similar to the one given earlier that Alito would rule differently were the case about a conservative pet cause.
Like I wrote, I am convincedthat if the law targeted causes that are important to conservatives such as religious liberties or the Second Amendment, I'm quite sure the hearing would have been granted. But of course, I don't have any conclusive factual evidence for that. We could look at the track record of the current court and argue about the various cases. We'd be talking about the problem of small statistics and the special circumstances of the pandemic. And those are the issues I can spontaneously think of.

But given how conservative judges have been pre-chosen, and what the criteria for this pre-selection are, the philosophical monoculture behind that, I think there is a very strong forcing for conservative judges to implement their beliefs within reason and the bounds of what they think of as the law.
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Waragainstsleep
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Sep 16, 2021, 09:49 AM
 
Originally Posted by subego View Post
The State doesn’t pay out the $10K, the defendant does.
That might work even better.

Lets imagine that the Governor gets named in a few hundred suits. Either it costs him a fortune and he has to put a stop to it, or it costs the state a fortune and he has to put a stop to it. And if he starts dismissing the suits that name him without proper investigation, it sets a precedent for others to do the same no?
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subego
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Sep 16, 2021, 02:15 PM
 
My guess is the person filing the suit is going to need to make a sworn affidavit, so that’s a risk of five in the slam if it’s bullshit.
     
subego
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Sep 16, 2021, 03:13 PM
 
Originally Posted by OreoCookie View Post
Again, from a pragmatic perspective I wouldn't even try to convince Alito, so I wouldn't particularly care what he has to say.
Alito is pivotal to any abortion case. As the “abortion specialist” for the conservative wing of the Court, he commands the ear of five Justices, including Roberts, who normally concurs with him. When it comes to abortion cases, Alito is far and away the most influential member of the Court.

Ignoring the most influential member of the Court is a radical strategy, no?



Edit: some slight corrections… I’ve been saying “Whole Woman’s Health” when it’s “Whole Women’s Health”, and the case I cited upthread is Whole Women’s Health v. Hellerstedt, not v. Texas.
( Last edited by subego; Sep 16, 2021 at 04:28 PM. )
     
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Sep 16, 2021, 08:24 PM
 
Originally Posted by subego View Post
Alito is pivotal to any abortion case. As the “abortion specialist” for the conservative wing of the Court, he commands the ear of five Justices, including Roberts, who normally concurs with him. When it comes to abortion cases, Alito is far and away the most influential member of the Court.
I don't think it is as simple as that, and that all SC Justices, especially the conservative ones, have a well-developed sense of where they stand with regards to abortion. In my observation, Thomas and Alito cannot be moved on the issue. I'd probably put Kavanaugh close to the Thomas/Alito camp. I don't have a solid feeling Justice Barrett. With Gorsuch it depends on the specifics of the case, but he has shown to be able to go against the conservative grain when he thinks that this is what his principles are telling him. Roberts is a swing vote.

So if you asked an amateur like me, I'd go after Roberts (who did indeed vote with the minority) and then Gorsuch and Barrett.
Originally Posted by subego View Post
Ignoring the most influential member of the Court is a radical strategy, no?
If your premise held, you'd have an argument. But I just don't think Alito is the most influential member of the Court, neither in general nor on this issue, nor would he be the one I would be targeting. Of course, I could be wrong about all this, I don't claim to be a SCOTUS whisperer or lawyer.

But I think my bigger argument still stands: you asked what logical reason there could be for not including the issue of standing in the initial brief. I think I gave a logically coherent case. Of course, you don't have to agree with all of my premises.
Originally Posted by subego View Post
My guess is the person filing the suit is going to need to make a sworn affidavit, so that’s a risk of five in the slam if it’s bullshit.
In practice, I don't think this is going to make a difference. Just have a look at how SLAP suits are handled in the US. And in this case I can see so many gaps for the person bringing the suit. Is it reasonable to think that someone who went to Planned Parenthood and had (unbeknownst to you since this is a very personal matter) a miscarriage went there to have an abortion? Would that already cover your rear end legally? What if the legal bills for the person bringing the suit are covered by some anti-abortion group?

This is so far skewed one way, it is not even funny. Even just the legal bills for the other side could be crushing — and they'd be subjected to a case through no fault of their own. Add to that all the anguish (especially if the woman suffered e. g. a miscarriage, which is very traumatizing). And I'll say it again: the person bringing the suit is injured in no way. You can't bring a suit against me if I hit your neighbor with my car.
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subego
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Sep 17, 2021, 01:05 PM
 
Originally Posted by OreoCookie View Post
Is it reasonable to think that someone who went to Planned Parenthood and had (unbeknownst to you since this is a very personal matter) a miscarriage went there to have an abortion? Would that already cover your rear end legally? What if the legal bills for the person bringing the suit are covered by some anti-abortion group?
This has nothing to do with my reply.

I was referring only to the proposal of combating the law by burying the Governor of Texas with spurious claims he was party to an abortion.

Anyone submitting such a case is committing perjury, which devalues the strategy.
     
subego
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Sep 17, 2021, 04:19 PM
 
Originally Posted by OreoCookie View Post
So if you asked an amateur like me, I'd go after Roberts (who did indeed vote with the minority)
Roberts doesn’t need to be convinced.

Roberts concurred with Alito’s dissent on Whole Woman’s Health v. Hellerstedt. Alito argued the law under review only made minor, severable violations of Planned Parenthood v. Casey, and the parts which didn’t should stand.

A few years later, June Medical Services v. Russo came before the Court. In his dissent, Alito made the exact same argument he made for Whole Woman’s Health v. Hellerstedt. Roberts disagreed* this time, and the reasoning he gave was even though he thought Whole Woman’s Health v. Hellerstedt was decided wrongly, he’s upholding the precedent the Court set with that decision.

In other words, Roberts isn’t willing to flip a five year old precedent on abortion he’s explicitly gone on the record saying he disagrees with. There is no way he’s going to flip 30-50 year old precedent.

Trying to convince Roberts is spending money to purchase an item that’s already been bought.


*I misremembered this, which nullifies my previous claim that Roberts usually agrees with Alito on abortion. So far the count is one agreement and two disagreements. My apologies.

Edit: I should also add I didn’t read Roberts’ opinion on June Medical Services v. Russo (though I did read Alito’s back when it happened). I’m taking the word of the press, who really shouldn’t be trusted.
( Last edited by subego; Sep 17, 2021 at 06:53 PM. )
     
OreoCookie
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Sep 17, 2021, 08:57 PM
 
Originally Posted by subego View Post
Roberts doesn’t need to be convinced.
We are talking about two different things: when I wrote convinced, I meant to hold a full hearing on the case. And Roberts did vote yes to that, so he was convinced. As for the arguments in the case itself, that’d be a different strategy.
Originally Posted by subego View Post
Roberts concurred with Alito’s dissent on Whole Woman’s Health v. Hellerstedt. Alito argued the law under review only made minor, severable violations of Planned Parenthood v. Casey, and the parts which didn’t should stand.
Even in the full case, I still don’t think your strategy makes any sense to me. Roberts has become the swing vote, so he’d be the first one to target, not Alito who’d be one of the last two on the list (together with Justice Thomas). But I’d still say that the main lines of argumentation in the case itself should be different different from the strategy of getting a full hearing in the first place.
Originally Posted by subego View Post
Trying to convince Roberts is spending money to purchase an item that’s already been bought.
Any abortion case has to fight a serious uphill battle with the current constellation of the Supreme Court. To stay within your analogy, you’d spend much more money on Alito and Thomas than Roberts.
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subego
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Sep 17, 2021, 10:40 PM
 
Originally Posted by OreoCookie View Post
Even in the full case, I still don’t think your strategy makes any sense to me. Roberts has become the swing vote…
If Roberts is unwilling to overturn recent abortion precedent he explicitly disagrees with, he’s not a swing vote. Roberts will uphold Roe and Casey. Full stop.
     
subego
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Sep 18, 2021, 12:10 AM
 
Originally Posted by OreoCookie View Post
Any abortion case has to fight a serious uphill battle with the current constellation of the Supreme Court. To stay within your analogy, you’d spend much more money on Alito and Thomas than Roberts.
I’d bank it all on Alito.

Since 2016, which is when I started paying close attention, we’ve had abortion opinions from Thomas, Gorsuch, and Kavanaugh. No other Justice on the Court has ever concurred with one of these opinions.

The abortion opinions Alito has written since 2016? Not counting Roberts, every single conservative Justice at least partially concurred with Alito on every single one of his opinions. Like I said, he’s the abortion specialist for the conservative wing of the Court, and is quite demonstrably “first among equals”.

I should add I’m also of the opinion Alito isn’t particularly interested in flipping either Casey or Roe. He’s going to try and smack the living shit out of the Hellerstedt decision, but that’s as far as it goes. Perhaps ironically, the Jackson decision right here convinced me even more.

In that decision, Alito stressed it had nothing to do with whether the law is constitutional. He didn’t need to do that. More illuminating however is in his dissent, Roberts doubled down. He reiterated the decision he dissented with has nothing to do with whether the Texas law is constitutional.

I believe Roberts is privy to Alito’s opinions, and if he thought Alito was going to shank Roe and/or Casey, he would have kept his mouth shut.
     
subego
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Sep 23, 2021, 11:45 PM
 
Space Force dress uniform.



Shirt and tie under a tunic looks dumb.
     
reader50
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Sep 23, 2021, 11:55 PM
 
Looks like a Star Trek top, from the movies II - VI, only in black instead of red.

Agree on the tie. Tunic or tie, not both.

Edit: I misremembered. ST uniforms use a corner shoulder clasp instead of a row of buttons. Still, the shape is similar.
     
subego
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Sep 23, 2021, 11:59 PM
 
I’d say more Battlestar Galactica, and to be pedantic, I think it might be navy blue. Tie is black.
     
Spheric Harlot
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Sep 24, 2021, 05:30 AM
 
Of all the useless bullshit to waste time and money on, "Space Farce"…

(not the branch itself, just the idiotic rebranding of existing forces to appeal to Hell-Yeah-Rednecks)

I like that the redundancy is reinforced by the silly costuming. Very on-point!
     
andi*pandi
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Sep 24, 2021, 09:14 AM
 
The buttons remind me of the navy, which is probably why they also do seem very battlestar galactica. Should not be a tie underneath just the jacket collar.



The rest of the internet agrees with subego also.
     
Laminar
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Oct 1, 2021, 08:27 AM
 
In 2019, 19 of the top 20 Facebook pages for American Christians were run by Eastern European troll farms.

These groups, based largely in Kosovo and Macedonia, have been particularly successful when it comes to targeting American Christians. Though they split their efforts among multiple pages, they were mostly operated by the same groups. Collectively, their Christian Facebook pages reach about 75 million users a month — an audience 20 times the size of the next largest Christian Facebook page.
...
The Facebook study was conducted in the lead up to the 2020 U.S. presidential election, and found that these troll farms were targeting the same audience that Russia attempted to manipulate in 2016 with their own Facebook misinformation campaign. Though Facebook was aware of the troll farms and their manipulation of Americans in 2016, they did little to address the issue.

“Our platform has given the largest voice in the Christian American community to a handful of bad actors, who, based on their media production practices, have never been to church,” wrote the report’s author, Jeff Allen, who used to be a senior-level data scientist at Facebook.
https://www.relevantmagazine.com/cul...n-troll-farms/

It'd be fascinating to find out the source of the anti-vax pages right now.
     
andi*pandi
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Oct 2, 2021, 09:05 AM
 
The MIT article:
https://www.technologyreview.com/202...2020-election/

Glad to see that most of the pages in the report are gone but... not all. Targeting not just christian groups but AA and natives.
     
subego
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Oct 2, 2021, 03:10 PM
 
The MIT article also points out the grift angle seems more important to them than ideology.
     
Laminar
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Oct 4, 2021, 11:17 AM
 
     
subego
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Oct 4, 2021, 05:06 PM
 
Either she realized Facebook was a trash fire when she joined up, or she didn’t.

If she did, her moralizing rings hollow. If she didn’t, her analytical skills are called into question.
     
reader50
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Oct 4, 2021, 06:59 PM
 
Perhaps she joined, thinking she could help fix the problems.
     
Thorzdad
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Oct 4, 2021, 08:36 PM
 
Often, you don’t really know how effed-up a company’s leadership is until you’re inside the walls. I worked at such a place once. It’s pretty demoralizing.
     
 
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