Political Irony

Everybody, including Republicans, like to tout small businesses as the strongest source of economic development. It is where most new jobs come from, not to mention new ideas.

Which is why people should shake their heads when Gov. (and likely presidential candidate) Scott Walker brags about his record in Wisconsin. A major study released this month shows that Wisconsin ranks dead last in new business start-up activity.

And this isn’t something that he can blame on his predecessor or on something else beyond his control. There is plenty of good reasons to blame Walker for the bad economic outlook for small businesses in the state.

For example, Walker (like other Republican governors) turned down federal money that Obamacare provided to expand Medicare and Medicaid. So if you depend on your regular job to provide health insurance, it is very difficult to quit it in order to start your own new business. It is just too risky.

Walker also turned down federal money to build a high-speed rail system, which would have provided thousands of jobs. In addition, his refusing the money caused a multinational manufacturing company to shut down their Wisconsin plant and sue the state for $65 million for breach of contract.

Perhaps most damning of all is that the Wisconsin Economic Development Corporation removed Walker as the agency’s chair because of scandals.

And you can’t blame it on other economic factors in the area. Ironically, Walker famously traveled to next-door Illinois with the slogan “Wisconsin is open for business” and tried to lure companies to relocate from that state. But while Wisconsin is suffering, Illinois is one of the states at the top of the rankings for start-up activity. And the country as a whole enjoyed the largest year-over-year start-up growth in two decades.

John Oliver points out the lack of justice in one important aspect of our justice system – paying bail – which makes a mockery of “innocent until proven guilty”:

And not only is this putting quite a few innocent people in jail, it is costing taxpayers a ton of money.

A few weeks ago, the PBS program “Frontline” broadcast “Secrets, Politics and Turture”, which they describe as “The secret history of the CIA’s controversial ‘enhanced interrogation’ methods”. You can watch this program online, and you really should.

Why am I saying this to you? Because there was a small amount of publicity after it was shown, but there was no major outcry. I think the media is afraid to make a big story out of this. And even worse, many Americans do not want to admit that we violated international law, our constitution, every reasonable moral code, and deliberately tortured people.

What’s worse to me are the people who claim torture was necessary to obtain important information in the fight against terrorism, when there is no evidence to support that claim. In fact, the program provides strong evidence that our rush to use torture actually prevented us from obtaining important information.

Not only are they lying about the use of torture, the CIA illegally destroyed evidence of it. The CIA’s chief operations officer destroyed hundreds of hours of videotape even though they were ordered not to by Congress and the courts. A reporter for The New Yorker was told “if those videotapes had ever been seen, the reaction around the world would not have been survivable.”

This is a big deal, and it shouldn’t just go away in a puff of abject denial. If we do not take strong steps now, we will torture again. We are better than that as a country. We have to be.

© Matt Bors

Why is it that many people who participate in discussions on the internet totally lose it? The same people likely would be much more reasonable if they were talking face-to-face. Some people think it is the lack of feedback, but there certainly is feedback on the internet. Others say that it is just people who need to get attention in an increasingly disconnected world. Or that you need to be shrill in order to be heard. I dunno. I think almost all of us, even the most reasonable, have said something on the internet that was a bit overboard.

I’m just happy that my readers have supported me in creating a little outpost where we can have reasonable discussions. Oh, and speaking of this blog, it recently turned seven years old!

[This is a guest post from Marc S. Berman, who has written numerous articles and opinion pieces on politics, law, and current events.]

America’s political divide now envelops the United States Supreme Court. For example, when the Court decides that the billionaire Koch brothers can buy elections, its ruling is perceived as conservative. Democrats stop smoking weed long enough to get furious. MSNBC’s ratings even crack the top 300 for a day.

But when the Court, say, rules that “required health insurance” is just another name for “tax”, and therefore Obamacare is legal, its decision is viewed as liberal. Republicans smash their martini glasses with five-irons. On the radio, Rush spends an entire show mocking the judiciary. (Interestingly, judge-bashing really sells the virility treatments advertised on Limbaugh’s program. Otherwise, that stuff only moves when Rush lambastes Hillary, which is the conventional way of arousing a dittohead.)

Some of the Supreme Court’s upcoming decisions will be controversial. Now’s a good time to remind ourselves that, in reality, judges are impartial. They decide cases solely based on the law. Their political views play no part in how they rule.

So what has caused Americans’ mistaken belief that Supreme Court decisions are political? It all comes down to vocabulary.

Unlike the decisions of Judge Milian on the People’s Court, high court rulings are written. And they are full of obscure legal verbiage.

Americans don’t understand judicial gobbledygook. Consequently, we don’t read Supreme Court decisions. Instead, we rely on experts to interpret the rulings for us. Because these “experts” have political agendas, they try to convince us that the Court takes sides in political controversies. In the trade, this is known as “freaking the freaking lazy base out so they’ll freaking show up at the freaking polls.”

Americans need to learn the truth about our judiciary. This means that we need to start reading Supreme Court decisions for ourselves. I am providing definitions for all key legal terms below. Know these words, and you’ll be able to understand any ruling:

• Habeas Corpus: Latin for “why has this guy been in Baltimore city jail for 12 years on a parking ticket?”
• Indictment: A formal charge against any Democratic senator who opposes Obama’s policy on Iran and Cuba.
• Stop and Frisk: The security check that all Court spectators endure before being seated.
• Hourly Rate: The amount a Supreme Court lawyer charges for 25 minutes of work.
• Justice (of the Supreme Court): A judge on the Court. To get appointed, a justice must be a paid-up member of the Harvard, Yale, or Columbia Alumni Societies, be friends with a senator, and belong to an ethnic group that voted for the president in the last election.
• Chief Justice: The justice who sits front-row-center for Court photographs.
• Constitution: A Rorschach (ink blot) test the justices use to decide cases. Each justice sees what he or she wants to.
• Law Clerk: An Ivy League law school graduate. Works for a justice. Must be expert in medieval punctuation patterns.
• Opinion: A written discussion of a case. Credited to a justice. Ghost-written by law clerks.
• Majority Opinion: An opinion by the justices who the winning party thinks are smart.
• Minority Opinion: An opinion by the justices who the losing party thinks are smart.
• Concurrence: An opinion by a justice who couldn’t make up their mind.
• Dissent: An opinion by a justice who offended boss Justice Anthony Kennedy.
• Recess: A 10 minute break during a court session. A recess is called when Justice Ginsberg, who just turned 82, wakes up from her siesta. The recess allows her to review the other justices’ notes.
• Reverse: What the Court does to a ruling in favor of a litigant stupid enough to hire an attorney the justices never met at a D.C. cocktail party.
• Affirm: A group of lawyers who share a conference room.
• Solicitor General: The lawyer who represents the federal government before the Court. She defends all laws that the president likes.

Now that you know the lingo, find a Court ruling you hate, and read it. It will be obvious that politics played no part. And the next time you hear some party operative whining that the Court is too political, you’ll know who not to freaking vote for.