In what is expected to be a session where abortion is front and center, SCOTUS picked up this little gem from Kentucky.
In Kentucky, they typically use a procedure called Dilation and Extraction (D&E) to perform an abortion. You can read about the details of how it’s performed here, if you’d like. It basically stops the fetal heartbeat, and the fetus is removed after the fetus is deceased. This is the most common method for a 2nd trimester abortion. And while many states accept the Roe v. Wade decision, it’s worth nothing that 2nd trimester abortions are certainly more controversial than first trimester, as viability comes into play the closer to term the pregnancy becomes.
We here at Logical Libertarian support the system set forth in Roe v. Wade, giving the woman a right to choose in early stage pregnancies. But we also acknowledge that within days of conception, it’s a human life, and it’s being ended. I have written previously why the abortion debate is often fraught with lies and misrepresentation here, so I won’t rehash in this post.
Kentucky saw fit to ban D&E as a 2nd trimester procedure. But then, Kentucky went through gubernatorial changes, as well as a new Secretary for the Cabinet of Health in Kentucky. The new people, unlike their outgoing counterparts do not support the law, and were content to let it die on the vine after a Kentucky district court and the 6th circuit federal appellate court invalidated the statute.
In walks Daniel Cameron, a potential SCOTUS pick for Trump before he ultimately lost out to Justice Barrett. He is the Kentucky AG, and he was like, “If you assholes don’t want to defend the law, I will.”
So SCOTUS isn’t necessarily even opining on the Kentucky law. But they are looking to decide whether Cameron has the right to step in and defend a law that the governor, and the head of the agency who administrates it, have chosen not to defend.
While I obviously don’t know Cameron, this appears to be a staunch pro-life person looking to be a hero as a lone defender of fetal rights.
The 6th circuit shot Cameron down, because they were like, “If we let you jump in, then every asshole with an axe to grind, will sit and wait until a case has been decided to their disliking, then jump in after the fact like some two-bit Superman coming to save the day. It’ll be like dogs and cats—living together—mass hysteria.”
Cameron went to SCOTUS, and was like, “I’m the fucking states attorney general. It’s my job to defend state law, whether the governor chooses to or not. Let me in, bitches!”
He also made it clear, he didn’t wait in the wings for shit. He found out the piece of shit health secretary was refusing to do anything, and two days later, filed his motion.
EMW however, is like, “When we sued, we sued the Health Secretary and the AG. The AG was now governor Beshear at the time. Beshear stepped down from the case, and agreed to abide by the district court’s ruling. So basically EMW is like, “The AG at the time made a decision. So a new AG can’t just roll in dirty, and negate all the shit their predecessor did.”
In an 8:1 decision, with only Sotomayor dissenting, SCOTUS ruled with Cameron. In an opinion written by Justice Alito, there’s no law limiting the jurisdiction of the attorney general in the way the respondents want. If he wants to defend the law, it’s his job, whether the governor or state congress give a fuck or not.
Sotomayor dissented, arguing that the court is bending over backwards to allow this Jesus freak to jump on the bandwagon late in the game. As such, she thinks they opened the door for any new AGs around the country, to come in after a party change, and try to overrule decisions they disagreed with.
This is a case about retirement benefits. But before you nod off, let me tell you about it.
David Babcock joined the National Guard back in 1970, served over 3 years, then went to flight school to become a pilot. But flying wasn’t his one true love, making planes flyable was. So he want back to the guard, and ended up as a technician who worked on planes for a civilian group, while he was still enlisted. He also spent a couple years in Iraq form 2004-2005.
When Babcock retired in 2009, he got money from the Civil Service Retirement System (CSRS) and from the military’s Defense Finance and Accounting Service. (DFAS)
Once he fully retired in 2014, Social Security was like, “Here’s your benefits fuckface. But we’re reducing them because you’re getting so much scratch from the CSRS and the DFAS.”
So Babcock was like, “Hold the fuck on, you assholes. According to the Windfall Elimination Provision (WEP), I should be exempted from you not giving me full benefits. I was fucking active duty military. You aren’t supposed to be doing that shit to us.”
The Windfall Elimination Provision, is basically a rule SSI has to say, “Hey look, if you’ve got money falling out of your asshole, you don’t need full SSI benefits. So we’re going to steal the money you paid into the system, and give it to some other dumb fuck who did nothing to earn it. OK?”
But generally, they don’t do this to active duty military, because they fucking risked their lives for these assholes who send them to every war-torn shithole the president or congress doesn’t like. So that’s Babcock’s beef.
The state however, is trying to say that a “Dual Service Technician” which is what Babcock was, isn’t the same as other military. Yes, he was in the military, but he was essentially a private contractor. The government fucking loves a technicality it can use to fuck someone in the neck.
Well, anyway. SSI didn’t see fit to agree Babcock was the type of military personal that should be exempted, and despite Babcock’s appeal, an Administrative Law Judge (ASL) sided with the assholes at SSI.
So now SCOTUS is being asked to decide if a dual status employee is still military for purposes of the military exemption of the windfall provision.
According to 8 out of 9 justices, it is not. He was a friend of the military, but he wasn’t out there risking getting his ass shot off. As the law was written by congress, he’s unfortunately fucked. But thank you for your assistance in the effort.
Gorsuch, the lone dissenter was like, “You other eight justices are being dicks to this poor motherfucker. He was invaluable to the war effort, he deserves to get paid.”
In what promises to be another snoozefest, we have another case that SCOTUS has as part of their original docket. Meaning, it’s not a case they choose to hear, it’s a case they have to hear.
In a case involving the two state with the most double letters in their name, Mississippi have beef over some water with Tennessee. The Middle Claiborne Aquifer is fucking huge. It spans several states including these two assholes.
Not sure what an aquifer is? Neither was I. It’s basically, underground rock which is porous and stores a lot of water inside it. So forget about the rock for a minute, just think of it as a huge lake that spans the states, but you can’t fucking see it, because it’s underground.
Tennessee’s Memphis Light, Water & Gas Division pumps a lot of water out of that mother fucker from wells in Tennessee, but near the Mississippi border. Mississippi expects a certain amount of water from it, too. They argue they can’t get what they want, because those greedy assholes in Tennessee take too much from near the border, which basically depletes Mississippi’s portion as it flows to Tennessee when they pump water out.
They claim that their own groundwater goes down into the aquifer. But when Tennessee pumps water from their side, Mississippi’s groundwater flows into Tennessee, and therefore, they lose it.
Anyway, the courts have in the past appointed a special master to sort this shit out. They try to make sure that states which share a body of water, get their fair share of that water, and one isn’t fucking over the other.
Typically, the courts use an “equitable apportionment” rule to rivers and shit. But this is the first time an aquifer is the source of the dispute. Mississippi is hoping to make the case that it doesn’t apply to groundwater. Presumably because what Tennessee is taking, isn’t that dissimilar to what one would expect in a similar dispute over a river.
The idea is that Mississippi probably has a much larger chunk of water underneath than Tennessee, so they think they should get more of the water that’s there, whereas Tennessee would argue they should get an equal cut.
Normally, the equitable apportionment rule weighs several factors, one of which is that the complaining state has to show how they were harmed by the other state’s taking of the water, putting a larger burden on Mississippi.
The bottom line is, this seems like some pretty amazing creativity on Mississippi’s part. The nature of water is that it fucking flows. Whether it’s above ground in a river, or below ground in an aquifer, that’s what water fucking does.
The idea that Mississippi is going to act like this groundwater is somehow supposed to be treated different than river water is a pretty big stretch in my mind. But fuck it, might as well waste the court’s time with this bullshit.
Justice Clarence Thomas came out asking if there was any previous cases where somehow, someone was taking water from a shared source, but not entering the property of the other state, and the courts offered a remedy that wasn’t “equitable apportionment.”
Justice Roberts and Justice Kagan also seemed as baffled as I am about how this could possibly be anything different than an equitable apportionment situation.
Read this bit of the transcript to see an argument only a lawyer could love. It is clear, he’s hoping they just won’t get that he’s full of shit.
John G. Roberts, Jr.
Well, what other cases would you — putting aside water, what other cases would you admit are subject to equitable apportionment?
John V. Coghlan
Your Honor, I’m not sure, and I’m not sure the equitable apportionment should or should not apply as a concept to groundwater.
I think there are reasons why, based on the nature of groundwater, it might not make sense. But I think the Court doesn’t need to address that question about whether or not equitable apportionment should apply to groundwater because, as I say, this is a different type of injury.
This is an injury where one state is reaching across the border and exercising control beyond its sovereign territory.
John G. Roberts, Jr.
Putting aside your reaching across the border, I mean, in — in the absence — you — you concede, don’t you, that the aquifer flows from Mississippi into Tennessee?
John V. Coghlan
We — we concede that there is some water that crosses the border, yes.
John G. Roberts, Jr.
Well, I suppose then you’re — you’re not saying that there’s no equitable apportionment of that water?
John V. Coghlan
I think, Your Honor, our point is that whether or not aquifers and groundwater should be subject to equitable apportionment is not the legal issue that we’re presenting before the Court. What we’re presenting is does Tennessee have the right to control the resource beyond Tennessee’s sovereign boundaries in Mississippi when Mississippi has not waived its sovereign right over control of that groundwater.
Elena Kagan
I’m not sure I understand that, Mr. Coghlan.
I mean, you’re not now saying that this is not an interstate water.
You’re conceding that it is an interstate water, is that correct?
John V. Coghlan
I don’t know that we’re conceding it, Justice Kagan.
Elena Kagan
You’re saying that you win even if it is an interstate water, is that correct?
John V. Coghlan
That’s correct.
Elena Kagan
Okay.
So you’re saying it’s irrelevant whether it’s an interstate water or not?
John V. Coghlan
That’s correct.
Elena Kagan
So let’s assume that it is an interstate water.
John V. Coghlan
Okay.
Elena Kagan
And you’re saying that the reason you should win is because — is because what? Because Mississippi is essentially doing something unnatural to have access to that interstate water? What —
John V. Coghlan
I’d say, Your Honor, it’s that Tennessee —
Elena Kagan
Tennessee, excuse me.
John V. Coghlan
That Tennessee is exercising control over groundwater while it is located within Mississippi’s sovereign territory.
Elena Kagan
Well, but Tennessee is doing things, I think you admitted, in — in — in one of the questions that Justice Thomas put to you — Tennessee is acting entirely within its own borders.
It is having effects on Mississippi, but that’s the case with respect to people using a flowing river, that if there’s a — a flowing river, Tennessee might be taking water from it, which has effects in Mississippi. So why is it any different?
John V. Coghlan
Justice Kagan, where I would disagree with you is that Tennessee is acting entirely within its own borders.
Their — their wells are physically located in Tennessee, but this pumping is creating a unnatural area of effect that’s predictable, measurable, and controllable, and that area of effect is having physical effect, unnatural —
Elena Kagan
Well, it’s have —
John V. Coghlan
— physical effects —
Elena Kagan
— it’s — it’s predictable, measurable, and controllable when an upstream state takes a lot of water from a river that that will leave the downstream state with less water.
All of that is predictable in the exact same way that one state is harming another, and yet we turn to equitable apportionment to deal with that.
John V. Coghlan
And I think, Your Honor, the difference as — as I — in this case is that in all of the Court’s equitable apportionment cases, the state who’s, you know, unnaturally having an effect on the water by taking and removing water is acting, and the effect of that is occurring — the direct effect of that is occurring entirely within the state’s sovereign territory and that whether or not the water ultimately doesn’t reach the downstream state because it doesn’t flow there is — is incidental, whereas, here, there is a direct intentional effect. The — the — the purpose of pumping is to move water.
And Tennessee is putting these wells next to the border, creating a vacuum, and of — of a measurable area of effect, and intentionally pulling the water out of Mississippi and exercising control, direct control I would say, over that groundwater while it is within Mississippi’s sovereign territory.
If you’re still as confused as I am as to what their justification is for treating this situation any different than others, then welcome to my world.
It should be pointed out, Mississippi is seeking millions in monetary damages, and Tennessee’s counsel was not shy about suggesting this was just an attempted money grab by Mississippi.
So now SCOTUS has to decide if Mississippi’s damages claim is legit, or some bullshit.
In a unanimous decision, SCOTUS agreed, Mississippi were being whiny little bitches, and Tennessee doesn’t owe them shit. Equitable apportionment was awarded, and Mississippi doesn’t get any more than that.
Eons ago, back in 2008, Tarahrick Terry, some random fucking crackhead, got his dumb ass busted with some crack—about 4 grams. To put that in perspective, a nickel is 5 grams. So basically, it was mountains of the stuff (sarcasm).
Because we have many drug laws written in an era that racism was still quite prevalent in government, crack cocaine, the drug of choice for the black community back then (it’s cheaper than regular cocaine), carries a much more severe penalty than regular cocaine, the drug white people tended to use, that is more expensive. At the time, it was a 100:1 ratio, which is fucking crazy. And while some people throw around racism pretty willy nilly, this law was in fact passed with intent to control the black population at the heart of it.
Terry was sent up the pokey for 188 months for his indiscretion! Over fifteen fucking years, for having some recreational crack on him. Fucking crazy!
In more modern times, this bill came to be a shining example of systemic racism, and in 2010, then president Barack Obama signed a bill reducing the 100:1 disparity down to 18:1. Because apparently the non-racist 1:1 number wasn’t deemed proper, a little racism is still apparently important to keep the wheels of justice turning.
Terry, seeing an opportunity to reduce his sentence by making the new standard retroactive, challenged his sentence in court. He was like, “Y’all motherfuckers knew this was wrong, and some racist bullshit, which is why you passed this new fucking law. I get it, I’m guilty and broke your dumb fucking laws, but my sentence is fucked up and you need to reduce it.”
In 2018, congress and Donald Trump passed the First Step Act, making sentencing reforms retroactive, allowing past offenders to be resentenced. Because you know, Donald Trump was a total bigot and hated black people (sarcasm). While I was no fan of Trump, I think the argument he was akin to some KKK person, was absolute nonsense, and while he was a grade A asshole, he was painted out to be an even bigger asshole than he really was. But anyway, moving on.
So here’s where it gets kinda silly. Aside from the 100:1 disparity, they also adjusted the tiers. The tiers were tier three = 0-5 grams, tier two = 5-50 grams, and tier one = 50+. The more you had, the bigger the sentence you got, since it would seem you were a dealer, not a user.
In the First Step Act, congress made tier one 280 grams and above, and tier two 28-280 grams. One would think then, that tier three was now 0-28 grams, right? RIGHT? Well, those no math doing motherfuckers didn’t fucking adjust tier three. It’s still 0-5 grams. So apparently, if you have between 5 and 28, you hit Bingo and and you’re free to go?
Now, here’s where Terry gets fucked. The First Step Act allowed for people whose sentences were modified by the law, to get resentenced. But as I just mentioned, tier three wasn’t fucking modified. So the courts were like, “Fuck you Terry, you aren’t part of this shit. Rot in jail, motherfucker.”
In a unanimous decision, the court ruled against Terry, and probably not uncoincidentally, the court’s only black justice, Clarence Thomas, wrote the opinion.
At first glance, one might think this is the court supporting systemic racism to it’s core. However, knowing the court still has three left wing justices who are the last people to support racism, it’s clear they were abiding by the text of the law, and effectively telling congress it’s their job to fucking fix this. That 5-28 golden spot is blatantly there for all to see, and it’s up to them to amend the law to cover that gap as they should have the first time they wrote it.
In their concurrence, they make clear that according to the law, if Terry were busted today for the same thing, he’d get the same sentence. So even if they overturn this, otherwise will befall the same fate. In her opinion, Sotomayor, made clear that the disparity between crack and cocaine was ridiculous, and was a clearly racist law. However, that was not the question they were faced. Hopefully, a new congress and a new president will see fit to fix this nonsense once and for all.
Read about the case and/or hear oral arguments at Oyez here or at SCOTUSBlog here.
We all know the People’s Republic of California love to rule with an iron fist, right? Well, federal regulations require charities to disclose a list of their major donors, to help protect those donor’s interests, in case those charities are doing some shady shit.
Well, California, believing themselves to be better than the federal government are requiring companies give them donor names and addresses as well. Here’s the rub.
California has had breeches of these lists, and leaked that info to the public. So for instance, if some dude has a hard on for Jesus, and donates to an anti-abortion group, Californians outs that motherfucker as an “anti women’s rights” person, when they had no desire to have their position publicly outed. While we here at Logical Libertarian are pro-choice, we consider a pro-life stance a fair belief to have, and that belief has nothing to do with women’s rights, it has everything to do with giving basic human rights to a human life that merely hasn’t exited the womb yet.
No one who’s pro choice is out there pushing to take away women’s rights in any other way. This is merely a misleading tactic to get people to join their side.
So charity Americans for Prosperity (AFP) and their peers are arguing this is a violation of their first amendment rights to freely associate, because it might deter them from otherwise donating to their cause.
They hear California’s argument that it’s to help prevent charities fraud, but they’re like, California never even uses that information to do that, all they do is fucking leak it when they don’t like people. Not to mention, the IRS already has that info.
In the words of the defense:
Because the attorney general has failed to take measures to adequately protect the Schedule B forms, some donors will consider the Attorney General’s scheme and reasonably conclude that the risks of disclosure are too great.
The group cited that California employees themselves, posted over 1800 of these forms on a public website, just to out donors they disliked.
California contends, this doesn’t directly prevent anyone from freely associating, so they’re calling bullshit. If people believe in a charity, they can donate to it all they want, we just want to know about it, and we may tell the world about it because we’re assholes.
So throughout the case, the terms strict scrutiny and exacting scrutiny have been bandied about. The petitioner’s want a strict scrutiny ruling. Which seems to mean that if the state wants this info, it has to go about getting it in the least intrusive way possible, and this isn’t it.
However, the state is arguing that an exacting scrutiny standard should be applied, and because this law doesn’t actually have a component to prevent free association, the petitioner’s argument is bullshit. They’re not associating because they’re afraid of being publicly outed, not because the state is preventing it. So it’s not EXACTLY preventing free association.
A handful of whiny twats in congress for the DNC asked Justice Barrett to recuse herself, since Americans for Prosperity donated heavily to help ensure she was confirmed to the supreme court. She was unimpressed with their argument, and did in fact participate. She’s nominated for life, after all, so there’s no power they hold over her, and she has no reason to side against what she thinks is right. This is likely an attempt at Democrats to both get more information for Commie Cali, and to attack Barrett for her Christianity again, as they did when she was confirmed.
We here at Logical Libertarian are also atheist, but we find these attacks on her religion equally disgusting as misrepresenting anti-abortion arguments.
Anyway, back to the case. California’s argument is that they need this info to investigate charities fraud. But the petitioner is like, “That’s some fucking bullshit. They never use this info for that. They never investigate charities fraud proactively, to where they’d need this info on hand. They only fucking investigate when there’s an actual accusation of fraud or some shit, in which case, they send an audit letter, or subpoena the info. So there’s no need to have this shit ahead of time.
Gorsuch, going after California, pushed on the right to privacy issue specifically, asking if the first amendment’s right to peaceably assemble also assumes some level of privacy, to which she responded it did. So then Gorsuch asked her to draw a distinction between California charities disclosed up front, and say some company being forced to send their company Christmas card list, to see if they’re friends with anyone government cares about, or who they’ve dated in the past so they try to compile data on who people end up marrying?
Counsel danced around this, in saying that if the people in question had a fear of reprisal, they could certainly argue that as a reason why not to disclose such info. But notice that this flips the script, and argues that government has a right to demand it, and it can only be thwarted if the people cite a reason why, as opposed to the people have a right not to disclose it, until government proves it has a compelling interest that supersedes their right to privacy. And this is why it’s Communist California, and not a state which gives a fuck about rights in any meaningful way.
Gorsuch however, interrupted her and said, “assume there’s no reprisal whatsoever.”
Here response:
Aimee A. Feinberg
I think that would be very difficult because, in that situation, there would be a significant burden on intimate association.
There would very likely be a significant burden resulting from public dissemination of that kind of information. And, as a result, the government would have to come forward with a commensurately strong justification, and it wouldn’t be clear to me in that context what that interest would be.
Call me crazy, but she ultimately just made the argument for the petitioner’s.
In a 6:3 partisan decision, liberty won out. The conservatives protected the 1st amendment rights of charitable donors against the commie assholes in California. The dissenters argued that this is a pretty creative interpretation of the first amendment, and opens the door to other shaky 1A arguments. But you know what, fuck those assholes. California was out of line, and I don’t mind saying it.
Bringing up some old WW2 shit, Rosalie Simon and company are survivors of the holocaust from Hungary. They sued Hungary in the US for damages incurred during the holocaust. Weirdly, they opted to sue here in the US, and not in Hungary, claiming that the Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act (FSIA) expropriation exception which reads:
A foreign state shall not be immune from the jurisdiction of courts of the United States or of the States in any case—in which rights in property taken in violation of international law are in issue and that property or any property exchanged for such property is present in the United States in connection with a commercial activity carried on in the United States by the foreign state; or that property or any property exchanged for such property is owned or operated by an agency or instrumentality of the foreign state and that agency or instrumentality is engaged in a commercial activity in the United States;
Basically saying that because these items were taken in violation of international law, they can be sued in our federal court. But the opposition argues that Hungarian courts should be given a crack at hearing this first, and they can’t just sue here in the US out of convenience.
The court enjoined this case with the Germany v. Philipp one, and kicked that shit back to Hungary, arguing this is basically none of our fucking business.
In a case with two names that can’t be pronounced by any reasonable person, we’re going to talk about free speech.
Chike Uzuegbunam, a student at Georgia Gwinnett College (GGC) is a religious dude, and he wanted to talk about his faith and shit with anyone who would listen. GGC has two free speech zones that can be reserved, and they told Chike to do that shit there. The rest of campus, he should keep his trap shut about any of his “God” propaganda.
Chike was like, “Fine you assholes,” and reserved one of those zones as he was asked, and then went on to spread the word of whatever religion it was he wanted to talk about. But Chike, is one dedicated mother fucker, and made up literature for that shit to go with his speeches.
So then the school was like, “Woah, we didn’t say you could pass out literature, man. WTF are you doing?”
So now Chike was like, “This is some bullshit” and sued them for violating his first amendment rights, and decided to seek damages.
The school, knowing they done fucked up, changed their rules accordingly, and then said, “See look at us, we fixed it. So now this case is moot, and we don’t owe him anything, right?”
But Chike was like, “Fuck you man, the damage was done. I appreciate you fixing it after the fact, but you can’t run over me with your car, put me in the hospital, and then say you don’t owe me for my hospital bills because you sell the car and can’t run over me anymore.”
So now here we are at SCOTUS to determine if mooting the case absolves GGC from owing Chike some scratch.
Chike’s side basically argues that a case is only moot if the courts have no action left to help them due to the changes made by the other party. While the school changed their policy, they didn’t do anything to compensate Chike as a result.
The defense of course didn’t suffer any injury, and therefore there isn’t any damages incurred.
Basically, the school was hoping SCOTUS would see they changed their rules, moot the case, and effectively sweep it under the rug, as opposed to dropping some legal hammer on them for shitting all over Chike’s 1st amendment rights. In order to make the case not moot, Chike’s team included like a fucking dollar’s worth of damages, so that even if the case is considered mooted because the school changed their rules, there’ still the matter of that fucking dollar to decide.
In an 8:1 decision, where only John Roberts dissented, SCOTUS ruled in favor of Uzuegbunam, saying that the nominal damages rendered the case not moot, and they could proceed, and the courts could ultimately decide the case for Uzuegbunam. That even nominal damages requested by the petitioner are worth deciding.
John Roberts in his lone dissent, was like, “You eight stupid assholes basically just ensured that every god damn case we’ll hear, from now to kingdom fucking come, will have a fucking dollar of damages added to it. Great job, dumbasses. We’ll never be able to moot a case and go home early every again. Serious, fuck you.
log·i·cal: capable of reasoning or of using reason in an orderly cogent fashion lib·er·tar·i·an: an advocate of the doctrine of free will; a person who upholds the principles of individual liberty especially of thought and action
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