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Strategies & Market Trends : 2026 TeoTwawKi ... 2032 Darkest Interregnum -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?


To: bart13 who wrote (130405)2/14/2017 2:34:51 PM
From: bart13  Read Replies (1) | Respond to of 217580
 
The So-Called Judge Crisis

I’m more inclined to agree with you, now that the three Ninth judges have spoken. There’s a good summary of the incoherent stretches they commit at nationalreview.com

(ignore the obligatory NRO it’s-really-Trump’s-fault asides.)

I’m still not worried about a Constitutional smashup in this particular instance – there’s a clear path out of it: Confirm Gorsuch, then appeal it to the Supreme Court.

But what this makes clear is that there’s a significant slice of the US court system where the politically incorrect will be reflexively ruled against even if it takes ignoring black-letter law.

I was immediately reminded of the trouble and expense Rand Simberg et al are still having over Michael Mann’s lawsuit. Various DC courts have spent years failing to toss out Mann’s suit, despite Simberg’s snarky line about Mann’s abuse of climate data clearly being a statement of opinion about a public figure, thus doubly protected.

The trend is clear: Rule of law will be set aside for the politically incorrect. Even if eventually overturned, in the protracted meantime the process will be the punishment. This is indeed a problem.

A problem many times over if the standard is to be routinely applied to acts of a politically incorrect President. The chaos and damage will be near-term and ongoing, the remedy of eventual overturn on appeal increasingly delayed as the higher courts clog up with such.

The constitutional answer of course is, impeach a few of the most egregious ignore-the-law judges, pour encourager les autres. But in the current climate, is there anything which might persuade 15 Dem Senators to go along? I’m not sure there is.

So, yes, the Ninth panel’s decision supporting anti-Administration lawfare implies a major Constitutional trainwreck sooner or later.



To: bart13 who wrote (130405)2/14/2017 6:49:52 PM
From: TobagoJack  Read Replies (2) | Respond to of 217580
 
regarding <<Interesting Times>>

a declaration of expectation per real news

zerohedge.com

Trump Expects Putin To "Return" Crimea To UkraineWith every passing day, it appears that many of the anticipated foreign policy changes under the new administration may end up being nothing but smoke and mirrors. First, it was the middle east, where despite campaign promises of pulling back US troops, Trump is instead considering adding to US deployments to reinforce what he plans to be Syrian "safe zones."

Then, during today's Sean Spicer press conference, the White House spokesman had that President Trump has been "tough" on Russia and expects Moscow to “return” the Crimea peninsula to Ukraine, the White House spokesman told reporters. Addressing the resignation of National Security Adviser Michael Flynn – hounded by the media over his contacts with Russian diplomats prior to Trump’s inauguration – Spicer pointed out that Russia “seized” Crimea under the Obama administration and that the Trump-appointed ambassador to the UN Nikki Haley has “strongly denounced the Russian occupation.”

"President Trump has made it very clear that he expects the Russian government to de-escalate violence in the Ukraine and return Crimea," Spicer said at a daily news briefing. "At the same time, he fully expects to and wants to get along with Russia."

That may be problematic if indeed Trump plans to perpetuate the policies of his predecessor. On February, the Nikki Haley said at the UN Security Council that “Crimea is a part of Ukraine. Our Crimea-related sanctions will remain in place until Russia returns control of the peninsula to Ukraine."

Russian envoy Vitaly Churkin responded by citing the US Constitution and pointing out that Crimeans overwhelmingly voted to join Russia, after the US-backed coup in February 2014 overthrew the elected government in Kiev.

It is in the national and economic interest of the US to have a good relationship with Russia, Spicer explained, but said that Haley “speaks for the president” on the matter of Crimea.

Flynn’s resignation on Monday followed several weeks of media furor over his telephone conversation with the Russian ambassador to the US in December, after the outgoing Obama administration expelled 35 Russian diplomats and seized two properties. Moscow chose not to respond in kind. “There is nothing that General Flynn did that was a violation of any sort,” Spicer said, explaining that the adviser was asked to resign because of Trump’s “eroding trust” after Flynn’s accounts of the conversation to administration officials did not square with what was leaked to the media.

However, with Democrats smelling blood in the water over the sensitive topic of the Trump administration's alleged proximity to Russia, and even Republicans now calling for an exhaustive probe into Trump-Russia relations, recent events may have well set back any potential thaw in Russia-US relations indefinitely.