Daily Archives: October 21, 2019

SCOTUS For The Average Joe

Average Joe SCOTUS: North Carolina Department of Revenue v. The Kimberley Rice Kaestner 1992 Family Trust

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Back in 1992, this dude Joe Rice set up a trust in New York for his three kids. We’re all gonna die someday, gotta take care of that shit before it happens. Then in 2002, the trust was broken up into three separate trust for his kids individually, and each of their kids, Joe’s grandchildren. But they were still based in New York.

None of his kids at the time the trust was set up, lived in North Carolina. But eventually, Kim found herself living there. And when a new trustee was appointed in 2005 to manage the trust, those greedy commie motherfuckers in North Carolina decided to start taxing the trust. The whole fucking trust…you know…the one that was in New York and not North Carolina? Clearly, NC is learning from California.

North Carolina’s argument was that, “Hey, we provide protections for this ungrateful bitch, and we pay for that via taxes, so we want our motherfucking cut.”

So Kim was like, “this is some bullshit!”

So off to SCOTUS to try to get her fucking trust back.

At one point, and incredulous Justice Breyer said:

Stephen G. Breyer

Look, the trustee lives in New York, okay? The settlor is in New York.

All the administration is in New York. There is one thing that’s going to happen in North Carolina.

The thing that’s going to happen in North Carolina is if she is there when it’s distributed, she’ll get some money. Okay? Which you’re totally free to tax. But that isn’t what you want to tax. You want to tax all these things which are everyone except her is in New York, and moreover, we don’t even know if she’ll ever get the money. Now there’s something wrong with that. I don’t know, it doesn’t say specifically about trusts in the Constitution, but, thus, I mean, lots of trusts say there are 10 beneficiaries, each one lives in a different state, and I, the trustee, have total discretion as to who give this money to and maybe I’ll give it to none of them. So here’s a woman who might get none of it, and you want to tax that.

Is that right? Do I have the facts right?

Matthew W. Sawchak

I would — I would point out some additional facts, Your Honor.

First of all, Ms. Kaestner did actually receive this money.

Stephen G. Breyer

Well, is that — is that — I’m talking about the law of North Carolina.

And I’d only add to this that, by the way, if the trust has a million dollars extra income in year 4, and if you say she’s entitled to that, she isn’t going to get it ’til year 14, at most, do you discount the increased value of the trust by the time she has to wait? Because she has nothing that increased in value more than the million discounted by the probability that she will ever get it and when.

Matthew W. Sawchak

So —

Stephen G. Breyer

Is that how the law works in North Carolina, is what I’m asking. And, of course, I suspect the answer is no, but go ahead. (Laughter.)

The solicitor for Kaestner rightly pointed out, Kaestner didn’t receive a fucking dime while North Carolina did. And there was no guarantee she would ever receive a dime while living in North Carolina, or not at all if she dies, or the trust somehow bankrupted itself. But in the meantime, North Carolina was taking their cut.

Clearly, North Carolina is whack on this bullshit, and SCOTUS wasn’t having it. Surprising unanimous decision for Mrs. Kaestner. A clear, “Go fuck yourself” to those greedy commies in North Carolina.

On a side note, this is a great example of SCOTUS being their own best skeptics. You cannot listen to this case, and think Sotomayor was ever going to side with Kaestner. Her questions seemed like she was firmly in the camp of North Carolina. But since it was a unanimous decision, it would appear she was just truly questioning her own beliefs, and came to the conclusion her own beliefs were against the principles laid forth in the constitution.

Libertarianism

Average Joe SCOTUS: Parker Drilling Management Services Ltd. v. Newton

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Parker Drilling Management Services (PDMS) hired this lazy motherfucker named Newton. He took breaks like he was part of a labor union, so they fired his lazy ass.

Being pissed he was fired, he decided to sue PDMS for unfair labor practices. He could have sued while he still worked there, if it bothered him that much, but he didn’t. He was just a lazy fuck trying to get revenge. The nature of his business was that he was on a drilling rig 14 days in a row, working in often 12-hour shifts.

The Fair Labor Standards Act, a federal law, has certain labor standards on how many breaks are required and shit. The Socialist Republic of California has their own commie bullshit laws. The drilling rig, while off the coast of California, was still not within California’s borders. So the issue was whether state law or federal law governs what goes on there. Sort of an argument as to whether “off the coast of California” is part of California, or its own unique district.

Newton sued in California, because he was hoping they’d rule in his favor with their commie bullshit laws. But PDMS presumably realized this was a federal case and took it to federal court, whose laws favored them. The federal court determined that the Outer Continental Shelf Lands Act  (OCSLA) allows for state laws to intervene on wage issues and such not covered in FLSA. But that it didn’t protect Newton in this instance over his excessive lazy-ass breaks. But the ninth circuit was like, “get fucked federal court” and vacated the judgement. They were arguing that state law should preempt federal law when the state law addresses the issue at hand. As if to say, that state law goes before federal law.

So off to SCOTUS we go.

SCOTUS clearly thought Newton was a lazy fuck, and that as usual, the ninth circuit was probably smoking crack—unanimous decision for PDMS. They basically said that if the Federal Law covers the scenario, that’s the applicable law and Cali’s commie bullshit is irrelevant. But if there is no standard in FLSA for an issue, then and only then can California law be used.

SCOTUS For The Average Joe

Average Joe SCOTUS: Iancu v Brunetti

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So this dude Eric Brunetti owns a clothing company called FUCT. Now, we can act like it’s an acronym all we want, but the point is clearly that it’s to be pronounced as “fucked.”

In 2011, an intent-to-use patent was filed for his brand, but the Lanham Act governs such patents, and section 2(a) says:

No trademark by which the goods of the applicant may be distinguished from the goods of others shall be refused registration on the principal register on account of its nature unless it—

(a) Consists of or comprises immoral, deceptive, or scandalous matter; or matter which may disparage or falsely suggest a connection with persons, living or dead, institutions, beliefs, or national symbols, or bring them into contempt, or disrepute; or a geographical indication which, when used on or in connection with wines or spirits, identifies a place other than the origin of the goods and is first used on or in connection with wines or spirits by the applicant on or after one year after the date on which the WTO Agreement (as defined in section 3501(9) of title 19) enters into force with respect to the United States.

So the attorney processing the request for the patent told the applicants to get fucked. (See what I did there?)

Brunetti appealed, and the appeals court agreed with the finding that it violated 2(a), but decided that such a restriction was a violation of the first amendment which guarantees free speech.

So off we go to SCOTUS, and it was a slam dunk. While Iancu tried to argue that government has a role to play in protecting our fragile little ears, and our fragile little psyches from such dastardly phrases as the word “fuck” or anything that sounds like it, despite the fact that we damn near all say it every day, the justices weren’t having it.

Iancu even busted out the George Carlin argument, about words you can’t say. Classic bit. But to no avail.

All nine justices agreed, it is a restriction on free speech, and Iancu from the Secretary of Commerce office can get FUCT.

Hear oral arguments or read about the case here.