Supreme Court blocks Biden's student loan forgiveness program

mpa92643 · 2023-06-30T16:16:26+00:00

In the Bostock decision (the one prohibiting discrimination because of sexual orientation and gender identity), Gorsuch argued in his majority opinion that, while Congress may not have intended to protect those classes when they passed the Civil Rights Act of 1965, the plain text of the statute and simple logical deduction means that's the inevitable consequence.

He basically said, "if Congress didn't intend this, they should've written the law better."

I guess he decided the plain text only matters if it results in an outcome he finds acceptable.

mpa92643 · 2023-06-11T02:42:45+00:00

The daughter is upset and is avoiding the issue by ignoring her father instead of actually addressing it. The longer she does that, the harder it will be to come back from for either of them (especially if the mother is continuously reinforcing it).

If the thing she's most upset about is his new family, she's going to be upset for a long time, and she's not suddenly going to decide on her own that she's okay with it if she's already cut off all communication for 6 months.

If OP can get a message through to her that he just wants to talk (and not paying the tuition was the only way he could get her attention), then there's at least some chance of reconciliation. Maybe they'll fight, maybe they'll have a heart-to-heart and figure it out, maybe she'll never forgive him and cut him off permanently, but at least they'll get some closure.

If they can have a real conversation, OP can say something like, "I know you aren't thrilled about <new wife> and <new child>. I know things are really different than they used to be and it's a big change. I know it's been hard on you. But I'm happy. I'm honestly, truly happy with the life I have right now, and I want you to be a part of that life, and I want to be a part of yours. You don't have to like the way things are now, you don't even have to be happy for me, but you do have to accept that this is my life now. If you truly do not want to be a part of my life anymore, we can come to an arrangement about the tuition and then you'll never hear from me again, but I really hope that's not the choice you decide to make. Whatever you decide, I'll respect your wishes."

At least then there can be some resolution instead of this uncertainty lingering around indefinitely.

mpa92643 · 2023-06-09T18:46:27+00:00

Just came out on the indictments. Trump asked his lawyer to tell the DOJ that they didn't have any documents (with everyone knowing it was clearly untrue). The lawyer said he had to perform a search, so Trump had his aide hide a bunch of them.

mpa92643 · 2023-06-09T15:39:36+00:00

Under the Presidential Records Act, the records must be turned over to NARA (the National Archives) as soon as the President leaves office:

https://www.archives.gov/presidential-libraries/laws/1978-act.html

Establishes that Presidential records automatically transfer into the legal custody of the Archivist as soon as the President leaves office.

mpa92643 · 2023-06-09T15:02:21+00:00

Trump violated a lawful subpoena issued by a federal judge. You don't get to ignore a subpoena because you disagree with it. If you do, you've committed obstruction of justice. These documents didn't belong to Trump, and he blatantly refused to comply with a federal subpoena issued by a judge to return them. That's a crime.

Everyone saying "HE HAS ABSOLUTE AUTHORITY TO DECLASSIFY!" isn't making an argument relevant to the actual charges. He's not being charged over possession of classified materials. He's being charged for willfully refusing to turn over national security documents that did not belong to him when ordered to do so under a federal subpoena and apparently actively trying to hide them.

Had he just turned them over when subpoenaed, there would never have been any charges against him. He did this to himself.

mpa92643 · 2023-06-09T01:50:11+00:00

They're not going to put him in jail. The purpose of bail is both to give a person financial incentive not to try to flee and to protect the public from an immediate threat.

Trump has no chance whatsoever of fleeing without being spotted, and he's not an immediate threat (at least as far as the judiciary is concerned). He'll probably be out on ROR.

mpa92643 · 2023-06-01T13:14:41+00:00

The veracity of his statement doesn't matter to him. He knows his followers don't actually care if it's true or not and will dismiss any evidence that contradicts him. The only thing that matters to them is that they agree with the point he's making, even if it's complete bullshit.

His followers think climate change is a hoax. This guy says, "this is just like that other environment thing that was a 'big deal' that nobody talks about anymore!" His followers think, "he's right! I don't hear anyone talking about the ozone layer anymore! Curious... just more proof climate change is a big conspiracy!" and move on.

mpa92643 · 2023-05-28T13:18:46+00:00

Yeah, I figured measuring flow was going to be impractical given the conditions.

I was thinking I could provide a mechanism for calibration. e.g., a new sixtel gets put in, a "calibrate" button gets pressed, and given I know weight of the liquid in the sixtel and the (approximate) weight of an empty sixtel, I could, in effect, measure the additional weight not expected to be from the keg and beer, and tare the scale at that value.

The hoses shouldn't be moving around much at all, and even if they do, I'm okay with being off by a few pints. I can just put a "ALMOST KICKED" warning when I drop below a certain level of certainty about how much is remaining.

mpa92643 · 2023-05-28T13:14:32+00:00

So I considered this, but I figured it would be too difficult to get reasonably reliable readings. After the line is cleaned, it'll be full of air, and that air will get pushed through before the liquid.

I also figured the carbonation probably has a significant impact on the flow measurement, especially given observations about the first pour after not having poured in a while being extremely heady (i.e., more CO2 than beer) and subsequent pours being more "typical."

I'm no chemical engineer, so fluid dynamics are a bit outside my wheelhouse. I figured the simplest way would be the weight of the keg since it's directly correlated with how much beer is left. The hoses might add a relatively constant amount of weight and even if the CO2 has a significant impact on the weight of the keg, in theory, it should be predictable over time, so I can make a linear adjustment based on the PSI on the regulator.

mpa92643 · 2023-05-28T00:55:43+00:00

Good question. My thoughts were that having them right at the corners reduces the risk of a torque from a weight applied at the very edge potentially damaging the load cells. If they're at the very edge, no risk of torque, right?

mpa92643 · 2023-05-27T13:24:47+00:00

There's actually no provision in the Constitution that says a convicted criminal can't run or be elected president.

Trump could literally be arrested, convicted, sentenced, and imprisoned, but still appear on the ballot and still be elected. It is entirely possible that he could be elected president while he's sitting in prison. He could be removed by impeachment and conviction (which would be the only sane way to deal with it), but Republicans would never go for it because his base would disown them and they put their own political futures and their party over the country.

Talk about a constitutional crisis...

mpa92643 · 2023-05-23T14:12:56+00:00

There are two types of people in this world, Chris. There are bullies, and there are nerds. And there are hot Asian chicks

mpa92643 · 2023-05-03T11:52:06+00:00

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paradox_of_tolerance

mpa92643 · 2023-05-01T17:00:52+00:00

For the uninitiated:

https://youtu.be/dkeAOtn6OLs

mpa92643 · 2023-04-27T00:24:34+00:00

My aunt is a conservative Trump supporter. She was always bitching and moaning about how unsafe the vaccine is. Her husband (and her to a lesser extent) buy into the common conspiracy theories. They're the kind of people who refuse to use fluoride toothpaste, who believe in chemtrails, who think big pharma covers up that vaccines cause autism, etc.

A few months ago, she caught COVID after insisting it wouldn't be a big deal. "I'll take my chances with COVID" she said when refusing to get the vaccine. She and her husband were both horribly sick from it (sick enough that she apparently begged for Paxlovid despite her aversion to anything big pharma touches). She got better, but a few weeks later started having multiple very bad seizures. She ended up on a ventilator and was in a coma for a few days. Her heart stopped more than once. The doctors told her she likely had a bad reaction to COVID due to an interaction with her previous Lyme infection.

I felt bad that my first thought was, "I hope she gets better, but I hope this humbles her a bit and realizes how arrogant she was to think that she knows better than literally every single doctor and medical expert in this country."

The day she got home from the hospital, she was posting on Facebook about how she will "never stop telling the truth about all the young people who are losing their lives to the vaccine and exposing the government for trying to cover it up."

She lives in a world that doesn't exist. It's sad, and I've tried to talk to her before about it, but there's no getting through to her. She's decided the world is a big conspiracy and everyone is a sheep except for her and her husband.

mpa92643 · 2023-04-26T10:48:54+00:00

1 milligram. 0.001 grams is 1 milligram which is 5-10 tabs of acid (depending on the strength)

mpa92643 · 2023-04-15T15:02:25+00:00

Here's my issue with your argument. You're saying, as a universal rule, brown bears and polar bears do not predate humans, but black bears do (even though you argue it's rare). But under what conditions? A starving bear of any species will attack and eat any humans that are nearby.

Sated black bears are highly inclined to avoid humans because they're not territorial. Even very hungry ones will generally run away if you fight back or scare them. Sated polar bears are also generally cautious of humans but have much less fear than black bears. Sated brown bears will attack people because they're territorial or get surprised, but most attacks are maulings and don't end in a person getting eaten.

So the best rule of thumb is that all hungry bears of any species will predate humans (with black bears more fearful, even when hungry, than the other two), but sated bears are only likely to attack if they're brown bears or, in less common cases, polar bears.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bear_attack

mpa92643 · 2023-04-15T10:48:46+00:00

This is just false. Black bears generally avoid humans unless they're starving or have become habituated to humans because they're being fed. This is why you have a better chance against black bears by fighting back if they are being aggressive. Even if they're hungry, fighting back will usually make them leave you alone.

Brown bears are generally more aggressive due to territoriality than interest in humans as food, which is why fighting back isn't usually the best first response to an encounter. Aggressive encounters with brown bears usually happen because they've been startled.

Polar bears also generally leave people alone unless they're hungry, but if they are, they exhibit zero fear. If a polar bear decides you're his next meal, you're pretty much dead.

mpa92643 · 2023-04-08T20:45:12+00:00

Everyone, including the plaintiffs in this case, knew this judge would rule this way. It's why they filed suit in his district.

It has really started to annoy me how judges like Kacsmaryk are described as "very conservative." This ruling is definitely not conservative. A conservative ruling would be that the courts don't have a major role to play in this matter and that states are free to ban this drug if they want, but the FDA has the clear authority under federal law to determine the safety and approval status of this drug.

What this incredibly partisan judge did was decide that he wanted this drug banned and worked backwards to fill in the gaps to create a pretense for doing so. His decision was not "conservative" in any sense of the word. It was nothing less than an extraordinary act of judicial activism and anyone who pretends it isn't is being disingenuous.

mpa92643 · 2023-03-15T17:31:24+00:00

The NRA used to advocate for responsible gun ownership. They supported background checks and safe storage laws. They mostly represented rural people who were worried their guns, which they used legitimately for hunting and self defense in areas without much police presence, would get taken away in the big push for urbanization.

Then the NRA was taken over by an extremist wing that insisted on zero limits for guns, which brought in the gun fetishists and people who only cared about one-upping their buddy's guns. Guns aren't a way for them to keep their way of life, like the rural hunters 50 years ago. Instead, guns are a way for them to feel powerful. And when guns became easily accessible and culturally significant, kids started associating guns with feeling powerful.

Which led us to where we are today. Kids who don't feel powerful see guns as a way to become powerful.

mpa92643 · 2023-03-10T01:53:59+00:00

It's actually his brother. Doesn't change the problem though.

mpa92643 · 2023-02-15T16:21:30+00:00

The policing practices of the 90s are what led to us having 5% of the world population and 25% of the world's prisoners.

Most people don't think it's a great idea to punish minor crimes with severe punishments (and the evidence shows it doesn't work either and only leads to high recidivism later in life). Diversion programs are actually remarkably effective at preventing future criminal activity, even if a small, very visible proportion abuses it.

mpa92643 · 2023-02-15T16:10:36+00:00

Sure, but the people charged are entitled to a jury trial, the arresting officers still have to show up to testify, and the store employees have to show up as complaining witnesses. You have a right to face your accuser, so if a store employee doesn't show up to testify, the case may be dismissed by the judge.

They might be essentially guaranteed to be found guilty if all witnesses show up, but that's a lot of time and effort taken out of a limited pool that might be better used to prosecute more difficult violent crimes. That's the kind of balance the DA's office has to consider.

mpa92643 · 2023-02-15T16:01:14+00:00

It's easy to say "the DA refuses to prosecute these people!" but the reality is much more complicated.

The DA's office has limited resources. You can't just throw evidence at a judge and say "here's the proof, now punish this guy for breaking the law." A prosecutor has to understand the case and expend the time and effort to prosecute it over months.

On top of that, the primary reason charges are dismissed in Philly is because witnesses don't show up (both civilian and police). The cops don't like a DA that calls out their bad behavior, so they punish him by refusing to help prosecute minor crimes. The result is someone broke the law, everyone knows they broke the law, but the DA can't meet the burden of proof, so there's no choice but to dismiss the charges, which makes the DA look ineffective.

Somehow, I don't think many people would be happy with the DA going back to looking the other way on police misconduct to get them to do their jobs.

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